CVE-2025-68244 drm/i915: Avoid lock inversion when pinning to GGTT on CHV/BXT+VTD
A lock inversion in the i915 driver on specific Intel hardware can cause a kernel deadlock, leading to system denial of service.
- 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-2025-68244?
CVE-2025-68244 is a vulnerability in Linux, published on 16 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:
drm/i915: Avoid lock inversion when pinning to GGTT on CHV/BXT+VTD
On completion of i915_vma_pin_ww(), a synchronous variant of dma_fence_work_commit() is called. When pinning a VMA to GGTT address space on a Cherry View family processor, or on a Broxton generation SoC with VTD enabled, i.e., when stop_machine() is then called from intel_ggtt_bind_vma(), that can potentially lead to lock inversion among reservation_ww and cpu_hotplug locks.
[86.861179] ====================================================== [86.861193] WARNING: possible circular locking dependency detected [86.861209] 6.15.0-rc5-CI_DRM_16515-gca0305cadc2d+ #1 Tainted: G U [86.861226] ------------------------------------------------------ [86.861238] i915_module_loa/1432 is trying to acquire lock: [86.861252] ffffffff83489090 (cpu_hotplug_lock){++++}-{0:0}, at: stop_machine+0x1c/0x50 [86.861290] but task is already holding lock: [86.861303] ffffc90002e0b4c8 (reservation_ww_class_mutex){+.+.}-{3:3}, at: i915_vma_pin.constprop.0+0x39/0x1d0 [i915] [86.862233] which lock already depends on the new lock. [86.862251] the existing dependency chain (in reverse order) is: [86.862265] -> #5 (reservation_ww_class_mutex){+.+.}-{3:3}: [86.862292] dma_resv_lockdep+0x19a/0x390 [86.862315] do_one_initcall+0x60/0x3f0 [86.862334] kernel_init_freeable+0x3cd/0x680 [86.862353] kernel_init+0x1b/0x200 [86.862369] ret_from_fork+0x47/0x70 [86.862383] ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30 [86.862399] -> #4 (reservation_ww_class_acquire){+.+.}-{0:0}: [86.862425] dma_resv_lockdep+0x178/0x390 [86.862440] do_one_initcall+0x60/0x3f0 [86.862454] kernel_init_freeable+0x3cd/0x680 [86.862470] kernel_init+0x1b/0x200 [86.862482] ret_from_fork+0x47/0x70 [86.862495] ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30 [86.862509] -> #3 (&mm->mmap_lock){++++}-{3:3}: [86.862531] down_read_killable+0x46/0x1e0 [86.862546] lock_mm_and_find_vma+0xa2/0x280 [86.862561] do_user_addr_fault+0x266/0x8e0 [86.862578] exc_page_fault+0x8a/0x2f0 [86.862593] asm_exc_page_fault+0x27/0x30 [86.862607] filldir64+0xeb/0x180 [86.862620] kernfs_fop_readdir+0x118/0x480 [86.862635] iterate_dir+0xcf/0x2b0 [86.862648] __x64_sys_getdents64+0x84/0x140 [86.862661] x64_sys_call+0x1058/0x2660 [86.862675] do_syscall_64+0x91/0xe90 [86.862689] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x76/0x7e [86.862703] -> #2 (&root->kernfs_rwsem){++++}-{3:3}: [86.862725] down_write+0x3e/0xf0 [86.862738] kernfs_add_one+0x30/0x3c0 [86.862751] kernfs_create_dir_ns+0x53/0xb0 [86.862765] internal_create_group+0x134/0x4c0 [86.862779] sysfs_create_group+0x13/0x20 [86.862792] topology_add_dev+0x1d/0x30 [86.862806] cpuhp_invoke_callback+0x4b5/0x850 [86.862822] cpuhp_issue_call+0xbf/0x1f0 [86.862836] __cpuhp_setup_state_cpuslocked+0x111/0x320 [86.862852] __cpuhp_setup_state+0xb0/0x220 [86.862866] topology_sysfs_init+0x30/0x50 [86.862879] do_one_initcall+0x60/0x3f0 [86.862893] kernel_init_freeable+0x3cd/0x680 [86.862908] kernel_init+0x1b/0x200 [86.862921] ret_from_fork+0x47/0x70 [86.862934] ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30 [86.862947] -> #1 (cpuhp_state_mutex){+.+.}-{3:3}: [86.862969] __mutex_lock+0xaa/0xed0 [86.862982] mutex_lock_nested+0x1b/0x30 [86.862995] __cpuhp_setup_state_cpuslocked+0x67/0x320 [86.863012] __cpuhp_setup_state+0xb0/0x220 [86.863026] page_alloc_init_cpuhp+0x2d/0x60 [86.863041] mm_core_init+0x22/0x2d0 [86.863054] start_kernel+0x576/0xbd0 [86.863068] x86_64_start_reservations+0x18/0x30 [86.863084] x86_64_start_kernel+0xbf/0x110 [86.863098] common_startup_64+0x13e/0x141 [86.863114] -> #0 (cpu_hotplug_lock){++++}-{0:0}: [86.863135] __lock_acquire+0x16 ---truncated---
Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-68244?
How do I fix CVE-2025-68244?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Is CVE-2025-68244 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-68244 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as BELL-CVE-2025-68244, DEBIAN-CVE-2025-68244, GHSA-gm59-gv97-mpp4, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-12-CVE-2025-68244, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-13-CVE-2025-68244, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2204-CVE-2025-68244 and 2 more.