CVE-2023-53513
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: nbd: fix incomplete validation of ioctl arg We tested and found an alarm caused by nbd_ioctl arg without verification. The UBSAN warning calltrace like below: UBSAN: Undefined behaviour in fs/buffer.c:1709:35 signed integer overflow: -9223372036854775808 - 1 cannot be represented in type 'long long int' CPU: 3 PID: 2523 Comm: syz-executor.0 Not tainted 4.19.90 #1 Hardware name: linux,dummy-virt (DT) Call trace: dump_backtrace+0x0/0x3f0 arch/arm64/kernel/time.c:78 show_stack+0x28/0x38 arch/arm64/kernel/traps.c:158 __dump_stack lib/dump_stack.c:77 [inline] dump_stack+0x170/0x1dc lib/dump_stack.c:118 ubsan_epilogue+0x18/0xb4 lib/ubsan.c:161 handle_overflow+0x188/0x1dc lib/ubsan.c:192 __ubsan_handle_sub_overflow+0x34/0x44 lib/ubsan.c:206 __block_write_full_page+0x94c/0xa20 fs/buffer.c:1709 block_write_full_page+0x1f0/0x280 fs/buffer.c:2934 blkdev_writepage+0x34/0x40 fs/block_dev.c:607 __writepage+0x68/0xe8 mm/page-writeback.c:2305 write_cache_pages+0x44c/0xc70 mm/page-writeback.c:2240 generic_writepages+0xdc/0x148 mm/page-writeback.c:2329 blkdev_writepages+0x2c/0x38 fs/block_dev.c:2114 do_writepages+0xd4/0x250 mm/page-writeback.c:2344 The reason for triggering this warning is __block_write_full_page() -> i_size_read(inode) - 1 overflow. inode->i_size is assigned in __nbd_ioctl() -> nbd_set_size() -> bytesize. We think it is necessary to limit the size of arg to prevent errors. Moreover, __nbd_ioctl() -> nbd_add_socket(), arg will be cast to int. Assuming the value of arg is 0x80000000000000001) (on a 64-bit machine), it will become 1 after the coercion, which will return unexpected results. Fix it by adding checks to prevent passing in too large numbers.
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>= 4.1, < 5.15.113>= 5.16, < 6.1.30>= 6.2, < 6.3.4CVSS 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
- None
- Integrity
- None
- Availability
- High
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/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 · scoped5.15.1136.1.306.3.4
Linux Kernel 5.15.113+ / 6.1.30+ / 6.3.4+ (depending on which branch you are on)
- Identify the currently running kernel version using `uname -r`
- Determine which stable branch your current kernel version belongs to based on the affected ranges: 4.1-5.15.x, 5.16-6.1.x, or 6.2-6.3.x
- For 5.15.x branch: upgrade to kernel 5.15.113 or later
- For 6.1.x branch: upgrade to kernel 6.1.30 or later
- For 6.2.x or 6.3.x branch: upgrade to kernel 6.3.4 or later
- Use your distribution's package manager to install the updated kernel (e.g., `apt-get update && apt-get install linux-image-<version>` for Debian/Ubuntu, or `yum update kernel` for RHEL/CentOS)
- Reboot the system to load the new kernel
- Verify the fix is applied by checking `uname -r` shows a version >= 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-2023-53513 — 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-2023-53513 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
No notes yet
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- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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