Bug 2376067 (CVE-2025-38169) - CVE-2025-38169 kernel: arm64/fpsimd: Avoid clobbering kernel FPSIMD state with SMSTOP
Summary: CVE-2025-38169 kernel: arm64/fpsimd: Avoid clobbering kernel FPSIMD state wit...
Keywords:
Status: NEW
Alias: CVE-2025-38169
Product: Security Response
Classification: Other
Component: vulnerability
Version: unspecified
Hardware: All
OS: Linux
medium
medium
Target Milestone: ---
Assignee: Product Security DevOps Team
QA Contact:
URL:
Whiteboard:
Depends On:
Blocks:
TreeView+ depends on / blocked
 
Reported: 2025-07-03 09:03 UTC by OSIDB Bzimport
Modified: 2025-07-04 03:55 UTC (History)
0 users

Fixed In Version:
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Description OSIDB Bzimport 2025-07-03 09:03:18 UTC
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

arm64/fpsimd: Avoid clobbering kernel FPSIMD state with SMSTOP

On system with SME, a thread's kernel FPSIMD state may be erroneously
clobbered during a context switch immediately after that state is
restored. Systems without SME are unaffected.

If the CPU happens to be in streaming SVE mode before a context switch
to a thread with kernel FPSIMD state, fpsimd_thread_switch() will
restore the kernel FPSIMD state using fpsimd_load_kernel_state() while
the CPU is still in streaming SVE mode. When fpsimd_thread_switch()
subsequently calls fpsimd_flush_cpu_state(), this will execute an
SMSTOP, causing an exit from streaming SVE mode. The exit from
streaming SVE mode will cause the hardware to reset a number of
FPSIMD/SVE/SME registers, clobbering the FPSIMD state.

Fix this by calling fpsimd_flush_cpu_state() before restoring the kernel
FPSIMD state.

Comment 1 Avinash Hanwate 2025-07-03 17:17:27 UTC
Upstream advisory:
https://lore.kernel.org/linux-cve-announce/2025070342-CVE-2025-38169-11b6@gregkh/T


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