CVE-2025-40070 pps: fix warning in pps_register_cdev when register device fail
A local attacker can trigger a kernel warning and potential instability in the PPS subsystem by exploiting improper error handling during device registration.
- 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-2025-40070?
CVE-2025-40070 is an use after free vulnerability in Linux, published on 28 Oct 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:
pps: fix warning in pps_register_cdev when register device fail
Similar to previous commit 2a934fdb01db ("media: v4l2-dev: fix error handling in __video_register_device()"), the release hook should be set before device_register(). Otherwise, when device_register() return error and put_device() try to callback the release function, the below warning may happen.
------------[ cut here ]------------ WARNING: CPU: 1 PID: 4760 at drivers/base/core.c:2567 device_release+0x1bd/0x240 drivers/base/core.c:2567 Modules linked in: CPU: 1 UID: 0 PID: 4760 Comm: syz.4.914 Not tainted 6.17.0-rc3+ #1 NONE RIP: 0010:device_release+0x1bd/0x240 drivers/base/core.c:2567 Call Trace: <TASK> kobject_cleanup+0x136/0x410 lib/kobject.c:689 kobject_release lib/kobject.c:720 [inline] kref_put include/linux/kref.h:65 [inline] kobject_put+0xe9/0x130 lib/kobject.c:737 put_device+0x24/0x30 drivers/base/core.c:3797 pps_register_cdev+0x2da/0x370 drivers/pps/pps.c:402 pps_register_source+0x2f6/0x480 drivers/pps/kapi.c:108 pps_tty_open+0x190/0x310 drivers/pps/clients/pps-ldisc.c:57 tty_ldisc_open+0xa7/0x120 drivers/tty/tty_ldisc.c:432 tty_set_ldisc+0x333/0x780 drivers/tty/tty_ldisc.c:563 tiocsetd drivers/tty/tty_io.c:2429 [inline] tty_ioctl+0x5d1/0x1700 drivers/tty/tty_io.c:2728 vfs_ioctl fs/ioctl.c:51 [inline] __do_sys_ioctl fs/ioctl.c:598 [inline] __se_sys_ioctl fs/ioctl.c:584 [inline] __x64_sys_ioctl+0x194/0x210 fs/ioctl.c:584 do_syscall_x64 arch/x86/entry/syscall_64.c:63 [inline] do_syscall_64+0x5f/0x2a0 arch/x86/entry/syscall_64.c:94 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x76/0x7e </TASK>
Before commit c79a39dc8d06 ("pps: Fix a use-after-free"), pps_register_cdev() call device_create() to create pps->dev, which will init dev->release to device_create_release(). Now the comment is outdated, just remove it.
Thanks for the reminder from Calvin Owens, 'kfree_pps' should be removed in pps_register_source() to avoid a double free in the failure case.
Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-40070?
How do I fix CVE-2025-40070?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Upgrade to the fixed version. These bugs are found with fuzzing and sanitisers and avoided by memory-safe languages. More about Use after free.
Is CVE-2025-40070 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-40070 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as BELL-CVE-2025-40070, DEBIAN-CVE-2025-40070, GHSA-24rq-hg3c-whf7, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-11-CVE-2025-40070, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-12-CVE-2025-40070, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-13-CVE-2025-40070 and 3 more.