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Fencer Vulns
high 7.8

CVE-2023-53747 json

vc_screen: reload load of struct vc_data pointer in vcs_write() to avoid UAF

published 2025-12-08 11 mo ago modified 2026-10-15 24 d ago also EUVD-2023-60081

cvss
7.8
version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.1%
EPSS 0.1% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 4%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

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

vc_screen: reload load of struct vc_data pointer in vcs_write() to avoid UAF

After a call to console_unlock() in vcs_write() the vc_data struct can be freed by vc_port_destruct(). Because of that, the struct vc_data pointer must be reloaded in the while loop in vcs_write() after console_lock() to avoid a UAF when vcs_size() is called.

Syzkaller reported a UAF in vcs_size().

BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in vcs_size (drivers/tty/vt/vc_screen.c:215) Read of size 4 at addr ffff8880beab89a8 by task repro_vcs_size/4119

Call Trace: <TASK> __asan_report_load4_noabort (mm/kasan/report_generic.c:380) vcs_size (drivers/tty/vt/vc_screen.c:215) vcs_write (drivers/tty/vt/vc_screen.c:664) vfs_write (fs/read_write.c:582 fs/read_write.c:564) ... <TASK>

Allocated by task 1213: kmalloc_trace (mm/slab_common.c:1064) vc_allocate (./include/linux/slab.h:559 ./include/linux/slab.h:680 drivers/tty/vt/vt.c:1078 drivers/tty/vt/vt.c:1058) con_install (drivers/tty/vt/vt.c:3334) tty_init_dev (drivers/tty/tty_io.c:1303 drivers/tty/tty_io.c:1415 drivers/tty/tty_io.c:1392) tty_open (drivers/tty/tty_io.c:2082 drivers/tty/tty_io.c:2128) chrdev_open (fs/char_dev.c:415) do_dentry_open (fs/open.c:921) vfs_open (fs/open.c:1052) ...

Freed by task 4116: kfree (mm/slab_common.c:1016) vc_port_destruct (drivers/tty/vt/vt.c:1044) tty_port_destructor (drivers/tty/tty_port.c:296) tty_port_put (drivers/tty/tty_port.c:312) vt_disallocate_all (drivers/tty/vt/vt_ioctl.c:662 (discriminator 2)) vt_ioctl (drivers/tty/vt/vt_ioctl.c:903) tty_ioctl (drivers/tty/tty_io.c:2778) ...

The buggy address belongs to the object at ffff8880beab8800 which belongs to the cache kmalloc-1k of size 1024 The buggy address is located 424 bytes inside of freed 1024-byte region [ffff8880beab8800, ffff8880beab8c00)

The buggy address belongs to the physical page: page:00000000afc77580 refcount:1 mapcount:0 mapping:0000000000000000 index:0x0 pfn:0xbeab8 head:00000000afc77580 order:3 entire_mapcount:0 nr_pages_mapped:0 pincount:0 flags: 0xfffffc0010200(slab|head|node=0|zone=1|lastcpupid=0x1fffff) page_type: 0xffffffff() raw: 000fffffc0010200 ffff888100042dc0 ffffea000426de00 dead000000000002 raw: 0000000000000000 0000000000100010 00000001ffffffff 0000000000000000 page dumped because: kasan: bad access detected

Memory state around the buggy address: ffff8880beab8880: fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb ffff8880beab8900: fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb >ffff8880beab8980: fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb ^ ffff8880beab8a00: fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb ffff8880beab8a80: fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb fb ================================================================== Disabling lock debugging due to kernel taint

Patch / fix

  • Linux Linux 4.14.327, 4.19.284, 5.4.244, 5.10.181, 5.15.113, 6.1.30, 6.3.4, 6.4
  • linux Debian 12 6.1.37-1
  • linux Debian 14, Debian 13 6.3.7-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2023-53747

  • linux Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-162.179
  • linux Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-83.92
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1109.118
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1044.49
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1112.121
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1041.49
  • linux-gke Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1041.46
  • linux-ibm Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1056.61

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2023-53747

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 9 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5
  • rv RHEL 9 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5
  • perf RHEL 9 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5
  • rtla RHEL 9 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5
  • bpftool RHEL 9 7.4.0-503.11.1.el9_5
  • libperf RHEL 9 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5
  • kernel-rt RHEL 9 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5
  • kernel-64k RHEL 9 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5

red hat advisories RHSA-2024:9315

  • kernel-64kb SLES 15 SP4-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP4-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP4-ESPOS 5.14.21-150400.24.194.1
  • kernel-syms SLES for SAP 15 SP4, SLES 15 SP4-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP4-LTSS +1 more 5.14.21-150400.24.194.1
  • kernel-source SLES for SAP 15 SP4, SLES 15 SP4-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP4-LTSS +1 more 5.14.21-150400.24.194.1
  • kernel-default SLES for SAP 15 SP4, SLES 15 SP4-LTSS, SLE Micro 5.4 +5 more 5.14.21-150400.24.194.1
  • kernel-obs-build SLES for SAP 15 SP4, SLES 15 SP4-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP4-LTSS +1 more 5.14.21-150400.24.194.1
  • kernel-default-base SLES for SAP 15 SP4, SLES 15 SP4-LTSS, SLE Micro 5.4 +3 more 5.14.21-150400.24.194.1.150400.24.98.3
  • kernel-rt SLE Micro 5.4, SLE Micro 5.3 5.14.21-150400.15.142.1
  • kernel-source-rt SLE Micro 5.4, SLE Micro 5.3 5.14.21-150400.15.142.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2026:0617-1SUSE-SU-2026:0473-1SUSE-SU-2026:0411-1SUSE-SU-2026:0317-1SUSE-SU-2026:0263-1

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-2023-53747 updated cvss 5.5

kernel: Linux kernel: Denial of Service via use-after-free in vc_screen

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, python-perf, kernel-kdump, +8 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, kernel-core, kernel-tools, +29 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 kernel-rt, kernel-rt-kvm, kernel-rt-core, kernel-rt-modules, kernel-rt-debug-kvm, kernel-rt-debug-core, +12 more
    affected: workaround, no fix available “Fix deferred”
  • Red Hat CodeReady Linux Builder (v. 9) libperf 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-debuginfo-common-s390x 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-debuginfo-common-x86_64 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-debuginfo-common-aarch64 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-debuginfo-common-ppc64le 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5 Red Hat Enterprise Linux AppStream (v. 9) rv 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, perf 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, rtla 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-devel-matched 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-64k-devel-matched 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-debug-devel-matched 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, +6 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux BaseOS (v. 9) bpftool 7.4.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-64k 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-core 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-tools 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, python3-perf 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, +29 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux Real Time (v. 9) kernel-rt 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-rt-core 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-rt-modules 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-rt-debug-core 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-rt-modules-core 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-rt-debug-modules 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, +4 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux Real Time for NFV (v. 9) kernel-rt 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-rt-kvm 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-rt-core 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-rt-modules 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-rt-debug-kvm 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, kernel-rt-debug-core 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5, +6 more
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2024:9315
  • Red Hat CodeReady Linux Builder (v. 9) kernel-cross-headers 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5 Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 perf, kernel, python-perf, kernel-kdump, kernel-firmware, kernel-bootwrapper, +1 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 kernel Red Hat Enterprise Linux AppStream (v. 9) kernel-headers 5.14.0-503.11.1.el9_5
    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
total
Assessed
24 d ago

Exploit prediction

0.15% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 4% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
CNA 3.1 7.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Affected products

  • Linux Linux

Classification

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.