CVE-2025-39988

Summary

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

can: etas_es58x: populate ndo_change_mtu() to prevent buffer overflow

Sending an PF_PACKET allows to bypass the CAN framework logic and to directly reach the xmit() function of a CAN driver. The only check which is performed by the PF_PACKET framework is to make sure that skb->len fits the interface's MTU.

Unfortunately, because the etas_es58x driver does not populate its net_device_ops->ndo_change_mtu(), it is possible for an attacker to configure an invalid MTU by doing, for example:

$ ip link set can0 mtu 9999

After doing so, the attacker could open a PF_PACKET socket using the ETH_P_CANXL protocol:

socket(PF_PACKET, SOCK_RAW, htons(ETH_P_CANXL));

to inject a malicious CAN XL frames. For example:

struct canxl_frame frame = {
	.flags = 0xff,
	.len = 2048,
};

The CAN drivers' xmit() function are calling can_dev_dropped_skb() to check that the skb is valid, unfortunately under above conditions, the malicious packet is able to go through can_dev_dropped_skb() checks:

  1. the skb->protocol is set to ETH_P_CANXL which is valid (the function does not check the actual device capabilities).

  2. the length is a valid CAN XL length.

And so, es58x_start_xmit() receives a CAN XL frame which it is not able to correctly handle and will thus misinterpret it as a CAN(FD) frame.

This can result in a buffer overflow. For example, using the es581.4 variant, the frame will be dispatched to es581_4_tx_can_msg(), go through the last check at the beginning of this function:

if (can_is_canfd_skb(skb))
	return -EMSGSIZE;

and reach this line:

memcpy(tx_can_msg->data, cf->data, cf->len);

Here, cf->len corresponds to the flags field of the CAN XL frame. In our previous example, we set canxl_frame->flags to 0xff. Because the maximum expected length is 8, a buffer overflow of 247 bytes occurs!

Populate net_device_ops->ndo_change_mtu() to ensure that the interface's MTU can not be set to anything bigger than CAN_MTU or CANFD_MTU (depending on the device capabilities). By fixing the root cause, this prevents the buffer overflow.

Affected Software

VendorProductVersion RangeStatus
LinuxLinux8537257874e949a59c834cecfd5a063e11b64b0b < 72de0facc50afdb101fb7197d880407f1abfc77faffected
LinuxLinux8537257874e949a59c834cecfd5a063e11b64b0b < c4e582e686c4d683c87f2b4a316385b3d81d370faffected
LinuxLinux8537257874e949a59c834cecfd5a063e11b64b0b < cbc1de71766f326a44bb798aeae4a7ef4a081cc9affected
LinuxLinux8537257874e949a59c834cecfd5a063e11b64b0b < b26cccd87dcddc47b450a40f3b1ac3fe346efcffaffected
LinuxLinux8537257874e949a59c834cecfd5a063e11b64b0b < e587af2c89ecc6382c518febea52fa9ba81e47c0affected
LinuxLinux8537257874e949a59c834cecfd5a063e11b64b0b < 38c0abad45b190a30d8284a37264d2127a6ec303affected
LinuxLinux5.13affected
LinuxLinux0 < 5.13unaffected
LinuxLinux5.15.194 <= 5.15.*unaffected
LinuxLinux6.1.155 <= 6.1.*unaffected
LinuxLinux6.6.109 <= 6.6.*unaffected
LinuxLinux6.12.50 <= 6.12.*unaffected
LinuxLinux6.16.10 <= 6.16.*unaffected
LinuxLinux6.17 <= *unaffected

Weaknesses

References