Skip to content
Fencer Vulns
medium 5.5

CVE-2021-29155 json

An issue was discovered in the Linux kernel through 5.11.x.

published 2021-04-20 5 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2021-15794

cvss
5.5
version 3.1, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
1.1%
EPSS 1.1% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 65%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

An issue was discovered in the Linux kernel through 5.11.x. kernel/bpf/verifier.c performs undesirable out-of-bounds speculation on pointer arithmetic, leading to side-channel attacks that defeat Spectre mitigations and obtain sensitive information from kernel memory. Specifically, for sequences of pointer arithmetic operations, the pointer modification performed by the first operation is not correctly accounted for when restricting subsequent operations.

Patch / fix

  • linux linux_kernel 5.11.16
  • linux Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 5.10.38-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2021-29155

  • linux Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-151.157
  • linux Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-77.86
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-1109.116
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1051.53
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1046.49
  • linux-gke Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1046.48
  • linux-kvm Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-1097.99
  • linux-kvm Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1041.42

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2021-29155

Ubuntu security data © Canonical Ltd., from https://github.com/canonical/ubuntu-security-notices via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

  • kernel RHEL 8 4.18.0-348.el8
  • perf RHEL 8 4.18.0-348.el8
  • bpftool RHEL 8 4.18.0-348.el8
  • kernel-core RHEL 8 4.18.0-348.el8
  • kernel-tools RHEL 8 4.18.0-348.el8
  • python3-perf RHEL 8 4.18.0-348.el8
  • kernel-modules RHEL 8 4.18.0-348.el8
  • kernel-zfcpdump RHEL 8 4.18.0-348.el8

red hat advisories RHSA-2021:4356RHSA-2021:4140

  • kernel-64kb SLES 15 SP3-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP3-LTSS, Enterprise Storage 7.1 5.3.18-150300.59.158.1
  • kernel-syms SLES for SAP 15 SP3, SLES 15 SP3-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP3-LTSS +1 more 5.3.18-150300.59.158.1
  • kernel-source SLES for SAP 15 SP3, SLES 15 SP3-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP3-LTSS +1 more 5.3.18-150300.59.158.1
  • kernel-default SLES for SAP 15 SP3, SLES 15 SP3-LTSS, SLE Micro 5.2 +5 more 5.3.18-150300.59.158.1
  • kernel-preempt SLES for SAP 15 SP3, SLES 15 SP3-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP3-LTSS +1 more 5.3.18-150300.59.158.1
  • kernel-obs-build SLES for SAP 15 SP3, SLES 15 SP3-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP3-LTSS +1 more 5.3.18-150300.59.158.1
  • kernel-default-base SLES for SAP 15 SP3, SLES 15 SP3-LTSS, SLE Micro 5.2 +3 more 5.3.18-150300.59.158.1.150300.18.92.5
  • kernel-64kb SLE Module for Basesystem 15 SP3 5.3.18-59.5.2

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2024:1489-1SUSE-SU-2021:1977-1SUSE-SU-2021:1975-1SUSE-SU-2021:1915-1SUSE-SU-2021:1624-1SUSE-SU-2021:1622-1

  • kernel-64kb openSUSE Leap 15.3 5.3.18-59.5.2
  • kernel-syms openSUSE Leap 15.3 5.3.18-59.5.1
  • kernel-obs-qa openSUSE Leap 15.3 5.3.18-59.5.1
  • kernel-source openSUSE Leap 15.3 5.3.18-59.5.2
  • kernel-default openSUSE Leap 15.3 5.3.18-59.5.2
  • kernel-preempt openSUSE Leap 15.3 5.3.18-59.5.2
  • kernel-kvmsmall openSUSE Leap 15.3 5.3.18-59.5.2
  • kernel-zfcpdump openSUSE Leap 15.3 5.3.18-59.5.2

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2021:1977-1openSUSE-SU-2021:1975-1openSUSE-SU-2021:0873-1openSUSE-SU-2021:0716-1

  • kernel CBL-Mariner 2.0 5.10.78.1-1

azure linux advisories AZL-6545

Azure Linux vulnerability data, Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation, from https://github.com/microsoft/AzureLinuxVulnerabilityData via OSV, under the MIT licence; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. MIT

  • linux Arch Linux 5.11.16.arch1-1
  • linux-hardened Arch Linux 5.11.16.hardened1-1
  • linux-zen Arch Linux 5.11.16.zen1-1
  • linux-lts Arch Linux 5.10.32-1

arch linux advisories AVG-1851AVG-1852AVG-1853AVG-1854

Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2021-29155 updated cvss 5.5

kernel: protection for sequences of pointer arithmetic operations against speculatively out-of-bounds loads can be bypassed to leak content of kernel memory

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, python-perf, kernel-kdump, +8 more
    affected: workaround, no fix planned “Will not fix”
  • Red Hat CodeReady Linux Builder (v. 8) kernel-debuginfo-common-x86_64 4.18.0-348.el8, kernel-debuginfo-common-aarch64 4.18.0-348.el8, kernel-debuginfo-common-ppc64le 4.18.0-348.el8 Red Hat Enterprise Linux BaseOS (v. 8) perf 4.18.0-348.el8, kernel 4.18.0-348.el8, bpftool 4.18.0-348.el8, kernel-core 4.18.0-348.el8, kernel-tools 4.18.0-348.el8, python3-perf 4.18.0-348.el8, +15 more
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2021:4356
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Real Time (v. 8) kernel-rt 4.18.0-348.rt7.130.el8, kernel-rt-core 4.18.0-348.rt7.130.el8, kernel-rt-modules 4.18.0-348.rt7.130.el8, kernel-rt-debug-core 4.18.0-348.rt7.130.el8, kernel-rt-debug-modules 4.18.0-348.rt7.130.el8, kernel-rt-modules-extra 4.18.0-348.rt7.130.el8, +2 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux Real Time for NFV (v. 8) kernel-rt 4.18.0-348.rt7.130.el8, kernel-rt-kvm 4.18.0-348.rt7.130.el8, kernel-rt-core 4.18.0-348.rt7.130.el8, kernel-rt-modules 4.18.0-348.rt7.130.el8, kernel-rt-debug-kvm 4.18.0-348.rt7.130.el8, kernel-rt-debug-core 4.18.0-348.rt7.130.el8, +4 more
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2021:4140
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 kernel Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 perf, kernel, python-perf, kernel-kdump, kernel-firmware, kernel-bootwrapper, +1 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 rv, perf, rtla, kernel, bpftool, libperf, +82 more
    not affected: vulnerable code not present

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

Exploit prediction

1.07% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 65% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.1 5.5 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N
NVD 2.0 2.1 AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:N/A:N

Classification

Weakness
Technology feeds

References

Sources

Fencer Vulns keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.