CVE-2019-12614

A flaw was found in the way Linux kernel's Dynamic Logical Partitioning (DLPAR) functionality on PowerPC systems handled low memory conditions on device discovery. An attacker who can change the LPAR configuration and incur low memory conditions at the same time could use this flaw to crash the system.

An attacker needs to be highly privileged to exploit this issue. He either needs to trigger LPAR configuration change (or wait for such event to happen) and incur low memory conditions at the same time. It could be argued that possessing privileges required to exploit this issue could have the same impact as the issue itself.

The indications say that this issue was found by static code analysing tool which looks for memory allocations without failure checks and not actually reproduced on a running system. The CVE assignment also looks automated and following the "better be safe than sorry" approach.

As such, this issue is theoretical in nature and Low impact at best.

The CVSS score(s) listed for this vulnerability do not reflect the associated product's status, and are included for informational purposes to better understand the severity of this vulnerability.

Mitigation for this issue is either not available or the currently available options don't meet the Red Hat Product Security criteria comprising ease of use and deployment, applicability to widespread installation base or stability.