Skip to content
Fencer Vulns
high 7.8

CVE-2024-49940 json

l2tp: prevent possible tunnel refcount underflow

published 2024-10-21 2 y ago modified 2026-10-30 9 d ago also EUVD-2024-43621

cvss
7.8
version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.3%
EPSS 0.3% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 25%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

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

l2tp: prevent possible tunnel refcount underflow

When a session is created, it sets a backpointer to its tunnel. When the session refcount drops to 0, l2tp_session_free drops the tunnel refcount if session->tunnel is non-NULL. However, session->tunnel is set in l2tp_session_create, before the tunnel refcount is incremented by l2tp_session_register, which leaves a small window where session->tunnel is non-NULL when the tunnel refcount hasn't been bumped.

Moving the assignment to l2tp_session_register is trivial but l2tp_session_create calls l2tp_session_set_header_len which uses session->tunnel to get the tunnel's encap. Add an encap arg to l2tp_session_set_header_len to avoid using session->tunnel.

If l2tpv3 sessions have colliding IDs, it is possible for l2tp_v3_session_get to race with l2tp_session_register and fetch a session which doesn't yet have session->tunnel set. Add a check for this case.

Patch / fix

  • Linux Linux 3.3, 3.17, 4.5, 4.10, 4.15, 6.1.191, 6.6.160, 6.11.3, 6.12
  • linux Debian 14, Debian 13 6.11.4-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2024-49940

  • linux-gcp-6.11 Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.11.0-1011.11~24.04.1
  • linux-oem-6.11 Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.11.0-1015.15
  • linux-azure-6.11 Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.11.0-1012.12~24.04.1
  • linux-nvidia-6.11 Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.11.0-1007.7
  • linux-nvidia-tegra Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1035.38

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2024-49940

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-coco SLE Module for Confidential Computing Technical Preview 15 SP6 6.4.0-15061.21.coco15sp6.1
  • kernel-syms-coco SLE Module for Confidential Computing Technical Preview 15 SP6 6.4.0-15061.21.coco15sp6.1
  • kernel-coco_debug SLE Module for Confidential Computing Technical Preview 15 SP6 6.4.0-15061.21.coco15sp6.1
  • kernel-source-coco SLE Module for Confidential Computing Technical Preview 15 SP6 6.4.0-15061.21.coco15sp6.1
  • kernel-source Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6.4.0-28.1
  • kernel-default Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6.4.0-28.1
  • kernel-kvmsmall Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6.4.0-28.1
  • kernel-default-base Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6.4.0-28.1.21.6

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2025:01919-1SUSE-SU-2025:20192-1SUSE-SU-2025:20270-1SUSE-SU-2025:20190-1SUSE-SU-2025:20260-1SUSE-SU-2025:1293-1

  • kernel-source-longterm openSUSE Tumbleweed 6.12.11-1.1
  • kernel-source openSUSE Tumbleweed 6.11.8-1.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2025:14705-1openSUSE-SU-2024:14500-1

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-2024-49940 updated cvss 5.5

kernel: l2tp: prevent possible tunnel refcount underflow

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, python-perf, kernel-kdump, +8 more
    affected: workaround, no fix planned “Out of support scope”
  • 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, +82 more
    affected: workaround, no fix planned “Will not fix”
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 perf, kernel, python-perf, kernel-kdump, kernel-firmware, kernel-bootwrapper, +1 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

0.33% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 25% 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
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

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.