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CVE-2021-47587: linux kernel vulnerability
CVE-2021-47587: critical vulnerability affecting linux kernel. Check CVSS, KEV status, business impact and recommended administrator actions.
- CVSS
- 9.8 CRITICAL
- EPSS
- 43.4%
- Known exploited
- not in KEV
- Product
- linux kernel
What is known
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net: systemport: Add global locking for descriptor lifecycle The descriptor list is a shared resource across all of the transmit queues, and the locking mechanism used today only protects concurrency across a given transmit queue between the transmit and reclaiming. This creates an opportunity for the SYSTEMPORT hardware to work on corrupted descriptors if we have multiple producers at once which is the case when using multiple transmit queues. This was particularly noticeable when using multiple flows/transmit queues and it showed up in interesting ways in that UDP packets would get a correct UDP header checksum being calculated over an incorrect packet length. Similarly TCP packets would get an equally correct checksum computed by the hardware over an incorrect packet length. The SYSTEMPORT hardware maintains an internal descriptor list that it re-arranges when the driver produces a new descriptor anytime it writes to the WRITE_PORT_{HI,LO} registers, there is however some delay in the hardware to re-organize its descriptors and it is possible that concurrent TX queues eventually break this internal allocation scheme to the point where the length/status part of the descriptor gets used for an incorrect data buffer. The fix is to impose a global serialization for all TX queues in the short section where we are writing to the WRITE_PORT_{HI,LO} registers which solves the corruption even with multiple concurrent TX queues being used.
Business impact
Successful exploitation of CVE-2021-47587, a critical vulnerability (CVSS 9.8) affecting linux kernel, may affect the confidentiality, integrity or availability of the vulnerable environment. The exact impact depends on the installed version, exposed interfaces and deployment configuration.
Recommended administrator action
Confirm whether linux kernel is present and compare installed versions with the vendor advisory and NVD record. Apply the vendor patch or documented mitigation; until remediation is complete, reduce exposure of affected interfaces, review relevant logs and monitor for indicators of exploitation. DataHouse can support version verification, managed patching, network exposure reduction, log review and backup validation for dedicated, cloud and colocated environments.