CVE-2025-38647 wifi: rtw89: sar: drop lockdep assertion in rtw89_set_sar_from_acpi
A lockdep assertion failure in the rtw89 WiFi driver during initialization can cause a kernel warning, potentially leading to system instability or 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-2025-38647?
CVE-2025-38647 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 22 Aug 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:
wifi: rtw89: sar: drop lockdep assertion in rtw89_set_sar_from_acpi
The following assertion is triggered on the rtw89 driver startup. It looks meaningless to hold wiphy lock on the early init stage so drop the assertion.
WARNING: CPU: 7 PID: 629 at drivers/net/wireless/realtek/rtw89/sar.c:502 rtw89_set_sar_from_acpi+0x365/0x4d0 [rtw89_core] CPU: 7 UID: 0 PID: 629 Comm: (udev-worker) Not tainted 6.15.0+ #29 PREEMPT(lazy) Hardware name: LENOVO 21D0/LNVNB161216, BIOS J6CN50WW 09/27/2024 RIP: 0010:rtw89_set_sar_from_acpi+0x365/0x4d0 [rtw89_core] Call Trace: <TASK> rtw89_sar_init+0x68/0x2c0 [rtw89_core] rtw89_core_init+0x188e/0x1e50 [rtw89_core] rtw89_pci_probe+0x530/0xb50 [rtw89_pci] local_pci_probe+0xd9/0x190 pci_call_probe+0x183/0x540 pci_device_probe+0x171/0x2c0 really_probe+0x1e1/0x890 __driver_probe_device+0x18c/0x390 driver_probe_device+0x4a/0x120 __driver_attach+0x1a0/0x530 bus_for_each_dev+0x10b/0x190 bus_add_driver+0x2eb/0x540 driver_register+0x1a3/0x3a0 do_one_initcall+0xd5/0x450 do_init_module+0x2cc/0x8f0 init_module_from_file+0xe1/0x150 idempotent_init_module+0x226/0x760 __x64_sys_finit_module+0xcd/0x150 do_syscall_64+0x94/0x380 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x76/0x7e
Found by Linux Verification Center (linuxtesting.org).
Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-38647?
It affects 1 product.
Products include Linux kernel.
How do I fix CVE-2025-38647?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Is CVE-2025-38647 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-38647 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel
Sources
Also known as BELL-CVE-2025-38647, GHSA-3v8v-6j5m-3mhg, UBUNTU-CVE-2025-38647.