CVE-2025-38537

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

net: phy: Don't register LEDs for genphy

If a PHY has no driver, the genphy driver is probed/removed directly in phy_attach/detach. If the PHY's ofnode has an "leds" subnode, then the LEDs will be (un)registered when probing/removing the genphy driver. This could occur if the leds are for a non-generic driver that isn't loaded for whatever reason. Synchronously removing the PHY device in phy_detach leads to the following deadlock:

rtnl_lock() ndo_close() ... phy_detach() phy_remove() phy_leds_unregister() led_classdev_unregister() led_trigger_set() netdev_trigger_deactivate() unregister_netdevice_notifier() rtnl_lock()

There is a corresponding deadlock on the open/register side of things (and that one is reported by lockdep), but it requires a race while this one is deterministic.

Generic PHYs do not support LEDs anyway, so don't bother registering them.

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.