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In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been...

Low severity Unreviewed Published Mar 12, 2025 to the GitHub Advisory Database • Updated Mar 13, 2025

Package

No package listedSuggest a package

Affected versions

Unknown

Patched versions

Unknown

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

mm/zswap: fix inconsistency when zswap_store_page() fails

Commit b7c0ccdfbafd ("mm: zswap: support large folios in zswap_store()")
skips charging any zswap entries when it failed to zswap the entire folio.

However, when some base pages are zswapped but it failed to zswap the
entire folio, the zswap operation is rolled back. When freeing zswap
entries for those pages, zswap_entry_free() uncharges the zswap entries
that were not previously charged, causing zswap charging to become
inconsistent.

This inconsistency triggers two warnings with following steps:

On a machine with 64GiB of RAM and 36GiB of zswap

$ stress-ng --bigheap 2 # wait until the OOM-killer kills stress-ng
$ sudo reboot

The two warnings are:
in mm/memcontrol.c:163, function obj_cgroup_release():
WARN_ON_ONCE(nr_bytes & (PAGE_SIZE - 1));

in mm/page_counter.c:60, function page_counter_cancel():
  if (WARN_ONCE(new < 0, "page_counter underflow: %ld nr_pages=%lu\n",
  new, nr_pages))

zswap_stored_pages also becomes inconsistent in the same way.

As suggested by Kanchana, increment zswap_stored_pages and charge zswap
entries within zswap_store_page() when it succeeds. This way,
zswap_entry_free() will decrement the counter and uncharge the entries
when it failed to zswap the entire folio.

While this could potentially be optimized by batching objcg charging and
incrementing the counter, let's focus on fixing the bug this time and
leave the optimization for later after some evaluation.

After resolving the inconsistency, the warnings disappear.

[[email protected]: refactor zswap_store_page()]
Link: https://lkml.kernel.org/r/[email protected]

References

Published by the National Vulnerability Database Mar 12, 2025
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Mar 12, 2025
Last updated Mar 13, 2025

Severity

Low

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector
Local
Attack complexity
Low
Privileges required
Low
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
Low

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector: More severe the more the remote (logically and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Attack complexity: More severe for the least complex attacks.
Privileges required: More severe if no privileges are required.
User interaction: More severe when no user interaction is required.
Scope: More severe when a scope change occurs, e.g. one vulnerable component impacts resources in components beyond its security scope.
Confidentiality: More severe when loss of data confidentiality is highest, measuring the level of data access available to an unauthorized user.
Integrity: More severe when loss of data integrity is the highest, measuring the consequence of data modification possible by an unauthorized user.
Availability: More severe when the loss of impacted component availability is highest.
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L

EPSS score

Exploit Prediction Scoring System (EPSS)

This score estimates the probability of this vulnerability being exploited within the next 30 days. Data provided by FIRST.
(12th percentile)

Weaknesses

No CWEs

CVE ID

CVE-2025-21860

GHSA ID

GHSA-gp26-q8h6-xxgj

Source code

No known source code

Dependabot alerts are not supported on this advisory because it does not have a package from a supported ecosystem with an affected and fixed version.

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