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Fencer Vulns
medium 5.5

CVE-2021-47542 json

net: qlogic: qlcnic: Fix a NULL pointer dereference in qlcnic_83xx_add_rings()

published 2024-05-24 2 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2021-34544

cvss
5.5
version 3.1, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.3%
EPSS 0.3% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 16%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

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

net: qlogic: qlcnic: Fix a NULL pointer dereference in qlcnic_83xx_add_rings()

In qlcnic_83xx_add_rings(), the indirect function of ahw->hw_ops->alloc_mbx_args will be called to allocate memory for cmd.req.arg, and there is a dereference of it in qlcnic_83xx_add_rings(), which could lead to a NULL pointer dereference on failure of the indirect function like qlcnic_83xx_alloc_mbx_args().

Fix this bug by adding a check of alloc_mbx_args(), this patch imitates the logic of mbx_cmd()'s failure handling.

This bug was found by a static analyzer. The analysis employs differential checking to identify inconsistent security operations (e.g., checks or kfrees) between two code paths and confirms that the inconsistent operations are not recovered in the current function or the callers, so they constitute bugs.

Note that, as a bug found by static analysis, it can be a false positive or hard to trigger. Multiple researchers have cross-reviewed the bug.

Builds with CONFIG_QLCNIC=m show no new warnings, and our static analyzer no longer warns about this code.

Patch / fix

  • Linux Linux 4.4.294, 4.9.292, 4.14.257, 4.19.220, 5.4.164, 5.10.84, 5.15.7, 5.16
  • linux Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 5.15.15-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2021-47542

  • linux Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-169.177
  • linux Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-100.113
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-1121.129
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1066.69
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1065.69
  • linux-ibm Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1015.16
  • linux-kvm Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-1107.109
  • linux-kvm Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1056.58

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2021-47542

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-syms SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES 12 SP5 4.12.14-122.225.1
  • kernel-source SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES 12 SP5 4.12.14-122.225.1
  • kernel-default SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES 12 SP5, SLE Workstation Extension 12 SP5 +2 more 4.12.14-122.225.1
  • kernel-obs-build SLE Software Development Kit 12 SP5 4.12.14-122.225.1
  • kernel-azure SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES 12 SP5 4.12.14-16.194.1
  • kernel-syms-azure SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES 12 SP5 4.12.14-16.194.1
  • kernel-source-azure SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES 12 SP5 4.12.14-16.194.1
  • kernel-rt SLE Real Time 12 SP5 4.12.14-10.197.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2024:2940-1SUSE-SU-2024:2901-1SUSE-SU-2024:2892-1SUSE-SU-2024:2190-1SUSE-SU-2024:2189-1SUSE-SU-2024:2185-1

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-2021-47542 updated cvss 4.1

kernel: net: qlogic: qlcnic: Fix a NULL pointer dereference in qlcnic_83xx_add_rings()

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, python-perf, kernel-kdump, +8 more
    affected: no fix planned “Out of support scope”
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 perf, kernel, python-perf, kernel-kdump, kernel-firmware, kernel-bootwrapper, +1 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, kernel-core, kernel-tools, +29 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 rv, perf, rtla, kernel, bpftool, libperf, +83 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

CISA SSVC

Exploitation
none
Automatable
no
Technical impact
partial
Assessed
2 y ago

Exploit prediction

0.25% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 16% 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:N/I:N/A:H

Affected products

  • Linux Linux

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.