CVE-2025-38168 perf: arm-ni: Unregister PMUs on probe failure
A missing cleanup in the arm-ni driver causes a kernel panic when resource allocation fails, leading to a denial of service.
- Exploited in the wild
- Not known
- Login needed
- Any signed-in user
- Attackable
- Local or same network only
- Victim action needed
- Not needed
- Fix
- Available
What is CVE-2025-38168?
CVE-2025-38168 is a high-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 3 Jul 2025. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Official description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
perf: arm-ni: Unregister PMUs on probe failure
When a resource allocation fails in one clock domain of an NI device, we need to properly roll back all previously registered perf PMUs in other clock domains of the same device.
Otherwise, it can lead to kernel panics.
Calling arm_ni_init+0x0/0xff8 [arm_ni] @ 2374 arm-ni ARMHCB70:00: Failed to request PMU region 0x1f3c13000 arm-ni ARMHCB70:00: probe with driver arm-ni failed with error -16 list_add corruption: next->prev should be prev (fffffd01e9698a18), but was 0000000000000000. (next=ffff10001a0decc8). pstate: 6340009 (nZCv daif +PAN -UAO +TCO +DIT -SSBS BTYPE=--) pc : list_add_valid_or_report+0x7c/0xb8 lr : list_add_valid_or_report+0x7c/0xb8 Call trace: __list_add_valid_or_report+0x7c/0xb8 perf_pmu_register+0x22c/0x3a0 arm_ni_probe+0x554/0x70c [arm_ni] platform_probe+0x70/0xe8 really_probe+0xc6/0x4d8 driver_probe_device+0x48/0x170 __driver_attach+0x8e/0x1c0 bus_for_each_dev+0x64/0xf0 driver_add+0x138/0x260 bus_add_driver+0x68/0x138 __platform_driver_register+0x2c/0x40 arm_ni_init+0x14/0x2a [arm_ni] do_init_module+0x36/0x298 ---[ end trace 0000000000000000 ]--- Kernel panic - not syncing: Oops - BUG: Fatal exception SMP: stopping secondary CPUs
Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-38168?
It affects 1 product.
Products include Linux kernel.
How do I fix CVE-2025-38168?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Is CVE-2025-38168 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-38168 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel
Sources
Also known as BELL-CVE-2025-38168, DEBIAN-CVE-2025-38168, GHSA-3pqf-m36q-w788, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2204-CVE-2025-38168, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2404-CVE-2025-38168, UBUNTU-CVE-2025-38168.