CVE-2025-71180 counter: interrupt-cnt: Drop IRQF_NO_THREAD flag
A race condition in the Linux kernel counter driver causes invalid wait context warnings and potential system instability due to improper IRQ threading flags.
- 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-2025-71180?
CVE-2025-71180 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 31 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:
counter: interrupt-cnt: Drop IRQF_NO_THREAD flag
An IRQ handler can either be IRQF_NO_THREAD or acquire spinlock_t, as CONFIG_PROVE_RAW_LOCK_NESTING warns: ============================= [ BUG: Invalid wait context ] 6.18.0-rc1+git... #1 ----------------------------- some-user-space-process/1251 is trying to lock: (&counter->events_list_lock){....}-{3:3}, at: counter_push_event [counter] other info that might help us debug this: context-{2:2} no locks held by some-user-space-process/.... stack backtrace: CPU: 0 UID: 0 PID: 1251 Comm: some-user-space-process 6.18.0-rc1+git... #1 PREEMPT Call trace: show_stack (C) dump_stack_lvl dump_stack __lock_acquire lock_acquire _raw_spin_lock_irqsave counter_push_event [counter] interrupt_cnt_isr [interrupt_cnt] __handle_irq_event_percpu handle_irq_event handle_simple_irq handle_irq_desc generic_handle_domain_irq gpio_irq_handler handle_irq_desc generic_handle_domain_irq gic_handle_irq call_on_irq_stack do_interrupt_handler el0_interrupt __el0_irq_handler_common el0t_64_irq_handler el0t_64_irq
... and Sebastian correctly points out. Remove IRQF_NO_THREAD as an alternative to switching to raw_spinlock_t, because the latter would limit all potential nested locks to raw_spinlock_t only.
Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-71180?
It affects 1 product.
Products include Linux kernel.
How do I fix CVE-2025-71180?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Is CVE-2025-71180 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-71180 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel
Sources
Also known as BELL-CVE-2025-71180, DEBIAN-CVE-2025-71180, GHSA-h9pq-jcwj-v49p, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-12-CVE-2025-71180, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-13-CVE-2025-71180, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2204-CVE-2025-71180 and 2 more.