CVE-2025-40296 platform/x86: int3472: Fix double free of GPIO device during unregister
A double free vulnerability in the Linux kernel int3472 driver allows local attackers to cause system crashes or potentially execute arbitrary code.
- Exploited in the wild
- Not known
- Login needed
- Not needed
- Attackable
- Local or same network only
- Victim action needed
- Not needed
- Fix
- Available
What is CVE-2025-40296?
CVE-2025-40296 is an use after free vulnerability in Linux, published on 8 Dec 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:
platform/x86: int3472: Fix double free of GPIO device during unregister
regulator_unregister() already frees the associated GPIO device. On ThinkPad X9 (Lunar Lake), this causes a double free issue that leads to random failures when other drivers (typically Intel THC) attempt to allocate interrupts. The root cause is that the reference count of the pinctrl_intel_platform module unexpectedly drops to zero when this driver defers its probe.
This behavior can also be reproduced by unloading the module directly.
Fix the issue by removing the redundant release of the GPIO device during regulator unregistration.
Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-40296?
How do I fix CVE-2025-40296?
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-2025-40296 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-40296 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as BELL-CVE-2025-40296, DEBIAN-CVE-2025-40296, GHSA-2g6j-xgp9-7mhx, UBUNTU-CVE-2025-40296.