Bug 2394600 (CVE-2025-39756) - CVE-2025-39756 kernel: fs: Prevent file descriptor table allocations exceeding INT_MAX
Summary: CVE-2025-39756 kernel: fs: Prevent file descriptor table allocations exceedin...
Keywords:
Status: NEW
Alias: CVE-2025-39756
Product: Security Response
Classification: Other
Component: vulnerability
Version: unspecified
Hardware: All
OS: Linux
low
low
Target Milestone: ---
Assignee: Product Security DevOps Team
QA Contact:
URL:
Whiteboard:
Depends On:
Blocks:
TreeView+ depends on / blocked
 
Reported: 2025-09-11 17:01 UTC by OSIDB Bzimport
Modified: 2025-09-11 20:30 UTC (History)
0 users

Fixed In Version:
Clone Of:
Environment:
Last Closed:
Embargoed:


Attachments (Terms of Use)

Description OSIDB Bzimport 2025-09-11 17:01:33 UTC
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

fs: Prevent file descriptor table allocations exceeding INT_MAX

When sysctl_nr_open is set to a very high value (for example, 1073741816
as set by systemd), processes attempting to use file descriptors near
the limit can trigger massive memory allocation attempts that exceed
INT_MAX, resulting in a WARNING in mm/slub.c:

  WARNING: CPU: 0 PID: 44 at mm/slub.c:5027 __kvmalloc_node_noprof+0x21a/0x288

This happens because kvmalloc_array() and kvmalloc() check if the
requested size exceeds INT_MAX and emit a warning when the allocation is
not flagged with __GFP_NOWARN.

Specifically, when nr_open is set to 1073741816 (0x3ffffff8) and a
process calls dup2(oldfd, 1073741880), the kernel attempts to allocate:
- File descriptor array: 1073741880 * 8 bytes = 8,589,935,040 bytes
- Multiple bitmaps: ~400MB
- Total allocation size: > 8GB (exceeding INT_MAX = 2,147,483,647)

Reproducer:
1. Set /proc/sys/fs/nr_open to 1073741816:
   # echo 1073741816 > /proc/sys/fs/nr_open

2. Run a program that uses a high file descriptor:
   #include <unistd.h>
   #include <sys/resource.h>

   int main() {
       struct rlimit rlim = {1073741824, 1073741824};
       setrlimit(RLIMIT_NOFILE, &rlim);
       dup2(2, 1073741880);  // Triggers the warning
       return 0;
   }

3. Observe WARNING in dmesg at mm/slub.c:5027

systemd commit a8b627a introduced automatic bumping of fs.nr_open to the
maximum possible value. The rationale was that systems with memory
control groups (memcg) no longer need separate file descriptor limits
since memory is properly accounted. However, this change overlooked
that:

1. The kernel's allocation functions still enforce INT_MAX as a maximum
   size regardless of memcg accounting
2. Programs and tests that legitimately test file descriptor limits can
   inadvertently trigger massive allocations
3. The resulting allocations (>8GB) are impractical and will always fail

systemd's algorithm starts with INT_MAX and keeps halving the value
until the kernel accepts it. On most systems, this results in nr_open
being set to 1073741816 (0x3ffffff8), which is just under 1GB of file
descriptors.

While processes rarely use file descriptors near this limit in normal
operation, certain selftests (like
tools/testing/selftests/core/unshare_test.c) and programs that test file
descriptor limits can trigger this issue.

Fix this by adding a check in alloc_fdtable() to ensure the requested
allocation size does not exceed INT_MAX. This causes the operation to
fail with -EMFILE instead of triggering a kernel warning and avoids the
impractical >8GB memory allocation request.


Note You need to log in before you can comment on or make changes to this bug.