Local service interrupt via leaked debugfs references
Published Mar 27, 2025 · Updated May 11, 2026
A memory leak in Linux kernel 6.0's Hyper-V balloon driver allows local users to exhaust kernel memory through repeated driver teardown. The hv_balloon_debugfs_exit function passes the dentry returned by debugfs_lookup directly to debugfs_remove without releasing the lookup reference, leaking memory on each cleanup. Exploitation requires a Hyper-V guest with the balloon driver and debugfs support plus local privileges to initiate repeated lifecycle operations; the documented consequence is availability loss, not data access or code execution.
Summary
What happened
A memory leak in Linux kernel 6.0's Hyper-V balloon driver allows local users to exhaust kernel memory through repeated driver teardown. The hv_balloon_debugfs_exit function passes the dentry returned by debugfs_lookup directly to debugfs_remove without releasing the lookup reference, leaking memory on each cleanup. Exploitation requires a Hyper-V guest with the balloon driver and debugfs support plus local privileges to initiate repeated lifecycle operations; the documented consequence is availability loss, not data access or code execution.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2023-52937
- Published
- Mar 27, 2025
- Updated
- May 11, 2026
- Vendor
- The Linux Kernel Organization
- Product
- Linux
- Classifications
- CWE-401, T1499.004
- Attack vector
- local
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Mar 27, 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=6.0
- Affected versionversion=d180e0a1be6cea2b7436fadbd1c96aecdf3c46c7 <0b570a059cf42ad6e2eb632f47c23813d58d8303
- Affected versionversion=d180e0a1be6cea2b7436fadbd1c96aecdf3c46c7 <6dfb0771429a63db8561d44147f2bb76f93e1c86
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.
Labels summarize the accepted research assessment. They do not indicate a test against your environment.
Technologies
Your stack
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Your stack
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