# CVE-2025-68772: f2fs: fix to avoid updating compression context during writeback

> A race condition in the Linux kernel f2fs filesystem allows a local attacker to cause a system crash via divide-by-zero during file writeback.

- **Severity:** Not scored
- **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:** Yes
- **Published:** 13 Jan 2026
- **Updated:** 11 May 2026
- **Also known as:** AZL-74387, BELL-CVE-2025-68772, DEBIAN-CVE-2025-68772, GHSA-p385-jwg8-m683, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-11-CVE-2025-68772, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-12-CVE-2025-68772, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-13-CVE-2025-68772, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2204-CVE-2025-68772, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2404-CVE-2025-68772, UBUNTU-CVE-2025-68772

## What is CVE-2025-68772?

CVE-2025-68772 is a vulnerability in Linux, published on 13 Jan 2026. 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:

f2fs: fix to avoid updating compression context during writeback

Bai, Shuangpeng <sjb7183@psu.edu> reported a bug as below:

Oops: divide error: 0000 [#1] SMP KASAN PTI
CPU: 0 UID: 0 PID: 11441 Comm: syz.0.46 Not tainted 6.17.0 #1 PREEMPT(full)
Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (i440FX + PIIX, 1996), BIOS 1.15.0-1 04/01/2014
RIP: 0010:f2fs_all_cluster_page_ready+0x106/0x550 fs/f2fs/compress.c:857
Call Trace:
 <TASK>
 f2fs_write_cache_pages fs/f2fs/data.c:3078 [inline]
 __f2fs_write_data_pages fs/f2fs/data.c:3290 [inline]
 f2fs_write_data_pages+0x1c19/0x3600 fs/f2fs/data.c:3317
 do_writepages+0x38e/0x640 mm/page-writeback.c:2634
 filemap_fdatawrite_wbc mm/filemap.c:386 [inline]
 __filemap_fdatawrite_range mm/filemap.c:419 [inline]
 file_write_and_wait_range+0x2ba/0x3e0 mm/filemap.c:794
 f2fs_do_sync_file+0x6e6/0x1b00 fs/f2fs/file.c:294
 generic_write_sync include/linux/fs.h:3043 [inline]
 f2fs_file_write_iter+0x76e/0x2700 fs/f2fs/file.c:5259
 new_sync_write fs/read_write.c:593 [inline]
 vfs_write+0x7e9/0xe00 fs/read_write.c:686
 ksys_write+0x19d/0x2d0 fs/read_write.c:738
 do_syscall_x64 arch/x86/entry/syscall_64.c:63 [inline]
 do_syscall_64+0xf7/0x470 arch/x86/entry/syscall_64.c:94
 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f

The bug was triggered w/ below race condition:

fsync				setattr			ioctl
- f2fs_do_sync_file
 - file_write_and_wait_range
  - f2fs_write_cache_pages
  : inode is non-compressed
  : cc.cluster_size =
    F2FS_I(inode)->i_cluster_size = 0
   - tag_pages_for_writeback
				- f2fs_setattr
				 - truncate_setsize
				 - f2fs_truncate
							- f2fs_fileattr_set
							 - f2fs_setflags_common
							  - set_compress_context
							  : F2FS_I(inode)->i_cluster_size = 4
							  : set_inode_flag(inode, FI_COMPRESSED_FILE)
   - f2fs_compressed_file
   : return true
   - f2fs_all_cluster_page_ready
   : "pgidx % cc->cluster_size" trigger dividing 0 issue

Let's change as below to fix this issue:
- introduce a new atomic type variable .writeback in structure f2fs_inode_info
to track the number of threads which calling f2fs_write_cache_pages().
- use .i_sem lock to protect .writeback update.
- check .writeback before update compression context in f2fs_setflags_common()
to avoid race w/ ->writepages.

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-68772?


## How do I fix CVE-2025-68772?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2025-68772 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-68772 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2025-68772 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2025-68772 is a vulnerability in Linux, published on 13 Jan 2026. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-68772 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Linux. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-68772/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-68772/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2025-68772
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2025-68772
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2025-68772

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-68772/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.