CVE-2023-53215
Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.
NVD · uneditedIn the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: sched/fair: Don't balance task to its current running CPU We've run into the case that the balancer tries to balance a migration disabled task and trigger the warning in set_task_cpu() like below: ------------[ cut here ]------------ WARNING: CPU: 7 PID: 0 at kernel/sched/core.c:3115 set_task_cpu+0x188/0x240 Modules linked in: hclgevf xt_CHECKSUM ipt_REJECT nf_reject_ipv4 <...snip> CPU: 7 PID: 0 Comm: swapper/7 Kdump: loaded Tainted: G O 6.1.0-rc4+ #1 Hardware name: Huawei TaiShan 2280 V2/BC82AMDC, BIOS 2280-V2 CS V5.B221.01 12/09/2021 pstate: 604000c9 (nZCv daIF +PAN -UAO -TCO -DIT -SSBS BTYPE=--) pc : set_task_cpu+0x188/0x240 lr : load_balance+0x5d0/0xc60 sp : ffff80000803bc70 x29: ffff80000803bc70 x28: ffff004089e190e8 x27: ffff004089e19040 x26: ffff007effcabc38 x25: 0000000000000000 x24: 0000000000000001 x23: ffff80000803be84 x22: 000000000000000c x21: ffffb093e79e2a78 x20: 000000000000000c x19: ffff004089e19040 x18: 0000000000000000 x17: 0000000000001fad x16: 0000000000000030 x15: 0000000000000000 x14: 0000000000000003 x13: 0000000000000000 x12: 0000000000000000 x11: 0000000000000001 x10: 0000000000000400 x9 : ffffb093e4cee530 x8 : 00000000fffffffe x7 : 0000000000ce168a x6 : 000000000000013e x5 : 00000000ffffffe1 x4 : 0000000000000001 x3 : 0000000000000b2a x2 : 0000000000000b2a x1 : ffffb093e6d6c510 x0 : 0000000000000001 Call trace: set_task_cpu+0x188/0x240 load_balance+0x5d0/0xc60 rebalance_domains+0x26c/0x380 _nohz_idle_balance.isra.0+0x1e0/0x370 run_rebalance_domains+0x6c/0x80 __do_softirq+0x128/0x3d8 ____do_softirq+0x18/0x24 call_on_irq_stack+0x2c/0x38 do_softirq_own_stack+0x24/0x3c __irq_exit_rcu+0xcc/0xf4 irq_exit_rcu+0x18/0x24 el1_interrupt+0x4c/0xe4 el1h_64_irq_handler+0x18/0x2c el1h_64_irq+0x74/0x78 arch_cpu_idle+0x18/0x4c default_idle_call+0x58/0x194 do_idle+0x244/0x2b0 cpu_startup_entry+0x30/0x3c secondary_start_kernel+0x14c/0x190 __secondary_switched+0xb0/0xb4 ---[ end trace 0000000000000000 ]--- Further investigation shows that the warning is superfluous, the migration disabled task is just going to be migrated to its current running CPU. This is because that on load balance if the dst_cpu is not allowed by the task, we'll re-select a new_dst_cpu as a candidate. If no task can be balanced to dst_cpu we'll try to balance the task to the new_dst_cpu instead. In this case when the migration disabled task is not on CPU it only allows to run on its current CPU, load balance will select its current CPU as new_dst_cpu and later triggers the warning above. The new_dst_cpu is chosen from the env->dst_grpmask. Currently it contains CPUs in sched_group_span() and if we have overlapped groups it's possible to run into this case. This patch makes env->dst_grpmask of group_balance_mask() which exclude any CPUs from the busiest group and solve the issue. For balancing in a domain with no overlapped groups the behaviour keeps same as before.
Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.
dbcve analysisA detailed technical summary for this CVE is being prepared.
Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.
NVD · CPE data< 4.14.322>= 4.15, < 4.19.291>= 4.20, < 5.4.251>= 5.5, < 5.10.188>= 5.11, < 5.15.150>= 5.16, < 6.1.42>= 6.2, < 6.4.7CVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.
From the vector- Attack vector
- Local
- Complexity
- Low
- Privileges
- Low
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.
dbcve · scoped4.14.3224.19.2915.4.251
Upgrade to kernel >= 4.14.322 (for 4.14.x), >= 4.19.291 (for 4.19.x), >= 5.4.251 (for 5.4.x), or >= 5.10.188 (for 5.10.x)
- 1. Identify the currently running Linux kernel version using `uname -r`
- 2. Determine which kernel branch you are running (e.g., 4.14.x, 4.19.x, 5.4.x, 5.10.x)
- 3. Based on your current branch, upgrade to a version at or above: 4.14.322, 4.19.291, 5.4.251, or 5.10.188
- 4. For RHEL/CentOS systems, update via `yum update kernel` or `dnf update kernel`
- 5. For Debian/Ubuntu systems, update via `apt-get update && apt-get install linux-image-<version>`
- 6. For Amazon Linux, update via `amazon-linux-extras update` or `yum update kernel`
- 7. Reboot the system to load the new kernel: `sudo reboot`
- 8. Verify the fix is applied by checking the kernel version with `uname -r` and confirming it's >= the fixed version for your branch
Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.
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Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2023-53215 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2023-53215 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
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