CVE-2024-56613
kernel: sched/numa: fix memory leak due to the overwritten vma->numab_state
Severity
LowRed Hat Product Security
CVSS 3.1
Review impact separately from score.
Published · December 27, 2024
Updated · November 21, 2025
Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
sched/numa: fix memory leak due to the overwritten vma->numab_state
[Problem Description] When running the hackbench program of LTP, the following memory leak is reported by kmemleak.
/opt/ltp/testcases/bin/hackbench 20 thread 1000
Running with 20*40 (== 800) tasks.
dmesg | grep kmemleak
... kmemleak: 480 new suspected memory leaks (see /sys/kernel/debug/kmemleak) kmemleak: 665 new suspected memory leaks (see /sys/kernel/debug/kmemleak)
cat /sys/kernel/debug/kmemleak
unreferenced object 0xffff888cd8ca2c40 (size 64): comm "hackbench", pid 17142, jiffies 4299780315 hex dump (first 32 bytes): ac 74 49 00 01 00 00 00 4c 84 49 00 01 00 00 00 .tI.....L.I..... 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ backtrace (crc bff18fd4): [<ffffffff81419a89>] __kmalloc_cache_noprof+0x2f9/0x3f0 [<ffffffff8113f715>] task_numa_work+0x725/0xa00 [<ffffffff8110f878>] task_work_run+0x58/0x90 [<ffffffff81ddd9f8>] syscall_exit_to_user_mode+0x1c8/0x1e0 [<ffffffff81dd78d5>] do_syscall_64+0x85/0x150 [<ffffffff81e0012b>] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x76/0x7e ...
This issue can be consistently reproduced on three different servers:
- a 448-core server
- a 256-core server
- a 192-core server
[Root Cause] Since multiple threads are created by the hackbench program (along with the command argument 'thread'), a shared vma might be accessed by two or more cores simultaneously. When two or more cores observe that vma->numab_state is NULL at the same time, vma->numab_state will be overwritten.
Although current code ensures that only one thread scans the VMAs in a single 'numa_scan_period', there might be a chance for another thread to enter in the next 'numa_scan_period' while we have not gotten till numab_state allocation [1].
Note that the command /opt/ltp/testcases/bin/hackbench 50 process 1000
cannot the reproduce the issue. It is verified with 200+ test runs.
[Solution] Use the cmpxchg atomic operation to ensure that only one thread executes the vma->numab_state assignment.
[1] https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/[email protected]/
CVSS score applicability
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
No mitigation is specified in collected source.
CVSS / CWE
CVSS 3.1 · 5.5CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
CWE-401 · Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime