Service interruption via thermal-driver reference-count leak
Published Feb 26, 2025 · Updated May 11, 2026
A reference-count leak in the Linux kernel i.MX SCU thermal driver allows local users to exhaust memory through repeated device probing. The imx_sc_thermal_probe function retains the device-tree node returned by of_find_node_by_name because it omits the matching of_node_put call. Reachability requires local low-privileged access and an i.MX system using this thermal driver; the reported consequence is limited to availability.
Summary
What happened
A reference-count leak in the Linux kernel i.MX SCU thermal driver allows local users to exhaust memory through repeated device probing. The imx_sc_thermal_probe function retains the device-tree node returned by of_find_node_by_name because it omits the matching of_node_put call. Reachability requires local low-privileged access and an i.MX system using this thermal driver; the reported consequence is limited to availability.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2022-49463
- Published
- Feb 26, 2025
- Updated
- May 11, 2026
- Vendor
- The Linux Kernel Organization
- Product
- Linux
- Classifications
- T1499
- Attack vector
- local
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Feb 26, 2025CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- May 11, 2026Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
Present is not the same as exploitable
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Is a vulnerable build present?
Compare these published version ranges with your installed build and any vendor patches.
- Affected versionversion=5.7
- Affected versionversion=e20db70dba1c0783b9878ce37171ad560b1ebaf3 <09700c504d8e63faffd2a2235074e8c5d130cb8f
- Affected versionversion=e20db70dba1c0783b9878ce37171ad560b1ebaf3 <0ec10303c10833c1bcba7a1bde2f297e494d5464
- Affected versionversion=e20db70dba1c0783b9878ce37171ad560b1ebaf3 <3ade442ea5d3512a3c67984489ab4d8a6fb3b29f
- Affected versionversion=e20db70dba1c0783b9878ce37171ad560b1ebaf3 <8bbf522a2c51ef939d0e8835e236bfcd252193af
- Affected versionversion=e20db70dba1c0783b9878ce37171ad560b1ebaf3 <ec0925b731697db7cab5944a3e55d2d58bb3d075
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.
Weakness, pattern, technique
Public exploit references
No public exploit references are available in this record.
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Technologies
Your stack
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Your stack
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