ax25: Remove broken autobind
CVE-2025-22109 · published 16 Apr 2025
How serious is it
- Severity: high, CVSS score 7.8 out of 10.
- No exploit prediction (EPSS) score yet.
- Not on the CISA list of exploited vulnerabilities.
- No public exploit in Exploit-DB.
Is your app affected by CVE-2025-22109?
Paste this prompt into Claude Code, Cursor or any AI coding tool: it runs a free Shippable scan of your project and fixes what it finds. Built with Lovable, Bolt or v0? Scan your live app. Or upload your package file.
Who is affected
- Linux Linux: 1da177e4c3f41524e886b7f1b8a0c1fc7321cac2 to < f364eb60987a55712bcfb9a69235bf3f31bfab5a, 1da177e4c3f41524e886b7f1b8a0c1fc7321cac2 to < 064bc39c23f72efbfbf189786da711d253451033, 1da177e4c3f41524e886b7f1b8a0c1fc7321cac2 to < 61203fdd3e35519db9a98b6ff8983c620ffc4696, 1da177e4c3f41524e886b7f1b8a0c1fc7321cac2 to < 2f6efbabceb6b2914ee9bafb86d9a51feae9cce8
- Linux Linux: 2.6.12
How to check
- Find out whether you run the affected product and which version, then compare it with the versions above.
How to fix
Copies a prompt for Claude Code, Cursor or Codex that asks it to check whether you run this product.
- Apply the vendor's update or mitigation from the references below. If there is none yet, limit exposure of the affected service until there is.
- If a vulnerable version was live, check your logs and rotate the secrets that server could read.
The advisory
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
ax25: Remove broken autobind
Binding AX25 socket by using the autobind feature leads to memory leaks
in ax25_connect() and also refcount leaks in ax25_release(). Memory
leak was detected with kmemleak:
================================================================
unreferenced object 0xffff8880253cd680 (size 96):
backtrace:
__kmalloc_node_track_caller_noprof (./include/linux/kmemleak.h:43)
kmemdup_noprof (mm/util.c:136)
ax25_rt_autobind (net/ax25/ax25_route.c:428)
ax25_connect (net/ax25/af_ax25.c:1282)
__sys_connect_file (net/socket.c:2045)
__sys_connect (net/socket.c:2064)
__x64_sys_connect (net/socket.c:2067)
do_syscall_64 (arch/x86/entry/common.c:52 arch/x86/entry/common.c:83)
entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe (arch/x86/entry/entry_64.S:130)
================================================================
When socket is bound, refcounts must be incremented the way it is done
in ax25_bind() and ax25_setsockopt() (SO_BINDTODEVICE). In case of
autobind, the refcounts are not incremented.
This bug leads to the following issue reported by Syzkaller:
================================================================
ax25_connect(): syz-executor318 uses autobind, please contact jreuter@yaina.de
------------[ cut here ]------------
refcount_t: decrement hit 0; leaking memory.
WARNING: CPU: 0 PID: 5317 at lib/refcount.c:31 refcount_warn_saturate+0xfa/0x1d0 lib/refcount.c:31
Modules linked in:
CPU: 0 UID: 0 PID: 5317 Comm: syz-executor318 Not tainted 6.14.0-rc4-syzkaller-00278-gece144f151ac #0
Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (Q35 + ICH9, 2009), BIOS 1.16.3-debian-1.16.3-2~bpo12+1 04/01/2014
RIP: 0010:refcount_warn_saturate+0xfa/0x1d0 lib/refcount.c:31
...
Call Trace:
<TASK>
__refcount_dec include/linux/refcount.h:336 [inline]
refcount_dec include/linux/refcount.h:351 [inline]
ref_tracker_free+0x6af/0x7e0 lib/ref_tracker.c:236
netdev_tracker_free include/linux/netdevice.h:4302 [inline]
netdev_put include/linux/netdevice.h:4319 [inline]
ax25_release+0x368/0x960 net/ax25/af_ax25.c:1080
__sock_release net/socket.c:647 [inline]
sock_close+0xbc/0x240 net/socket.c:1398
__fput+0x3e9/0x9f0 fs/file_table.c:464
__do_sys_close fs/open.c:1580 [inline]
__se_sys_close fs/open.c:1565 [inline]
__x64_sys_close+0x7f/0x110 fs/open.c:1565
do_syscall_x64 arch/x86/entry/common.c:52 [inline]
do_syscall_64+0xf3/0x230 arch/x86/entry/common.c:83
entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f
...
</TASK>
================================================================
Considering the issues above and the comments left in the code that say:
"check if we can remove this feature. It is broken."; "autobinding in this
may or may not work"; - it is better to completely remove this feature than
to fix it because it is broken and leads to various kinds of memory bugs.
Now calling connect() without first binding socket will result in an
error (-EINVAL). Userspace software that relies on the autobind feature
might get broken. However, this feature does not seem widely used with
this specific driver as it was not reliable at any point of time, and it
is already broken anyway. E.g. ax25-tools and ax25-apps packages for
popular distributions do not use the autobind feature for AF_AX25.
Found by Linux Verification Center (linuxtesting.org) with Syzkaller.
Check your whole app
Dependencies are only half of it. Free and read-only: before you push, run npx shippable-dev scan localhost:3000 in your project folder, no account needed. For your live app, you prove it's yours with a one-line tag first.
References
- git.kernel.org/stable/c/f364eb60987a55712bcfb9a69235bf3f31bfab5a
- git.kernel.org/stable/c/064bc39c23f72efbfbf189786da711d253451033
- git.kernel.org/stable/c/61203fdd3e35519db9a98b6ff8983c620ffc4696
- git.kernel.org/stable/c/2f6efbabceb6b2914ee9bafb86d9a51feae9cce8
Merged from CVE List. Last updated 25 Oct 2026. All vulnerabilities · RSS · JSON