Bug 2424952 (CVE-2022-50709)

Summary: CVE-2022-50709 kernel: wifi: ath9k: avoid uninit memory read in ath9k_htc_rx_msg()
Product: [Other] Security Response Reporter: OSIDB Bzimport <bzimport>
Component: vulnerabilityAssignee: Product Security DevOps Team <prodsec-dev>
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OS: Linux   
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Description OSIDB Bzimport 2025-12-24 12:03:15 UTC
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

wifi: ath9k: avoid uninit memory read in ath9k_htc_rx_msg()

syzbot is reporting uninit value at ath9k_htc_rx_msg() [1], for
ioctl(USB_RAW_IOCTL_EP_WRITE) can call ath9k_hif_usb_rx_stream() with
pkt_len = 0 but ath9k_hif_usb_rx_stream() uses
__dev_alloc_skb(pkt_len + 32, GFP_ATOMIC) based on an assumption that
pkt_len is valid. As a result, ath9k_hif_usb_rx_stream() allocates skb
with uninitialized memory and ath9k_htc_rx_msg() is reading from
uninitialized memory.

Since bytes accessed by ath9k_htc_rx_msg() is not known until
ath9k_htc_rx_msg() is called, it would be difficult to check minimal valid
pkt_len at "if (pkt_len > 2 * MAX_RX_BUF_SIZE) {" line in
ath9k_hif_usb_rx_stream().

We have two choices. One is to workaround by adding __GFP_ZERO so that
ath9k_htc_rx_msg() sees 0 if pkt_len is invalid. The other is to let
ath9k_htc_rx_msg() validate pkt_len before accessing. This patch chose
the latter.

Note that I'm not sure threshold condition is correct, for I can't find
details on possible packet length used by this protocol.