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Linux KernelOperating system · Linux

CVE-2025-38406

MEDIUM · 5.5 CVSS v3.1 Published 2025-07-25
Fix available
A fix is available. Upgrade to 5.4.296 / 5.10.240 or later.
See remediation →
57/100
Remediation priority · Elevated
Zero-click Patch available

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 · unedited
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: wifi: ath6kl: remove WARN on bad firmware input If the firmware gives bad input, that's nothing to do with the driver's stack at this point etc., so the WARN_ON() doesn't add any value. Additionally, this is one of the top syzbot reports now. Just print a message, and as an added bonus, print the sizes too.

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 analysis

A 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
Linux KernelOperating system
Affected:< 5.4.296>= 5.5, < 5.10.240>= 5.11, < 5.15.187>= 5.16, < 6.1.144>= 6.2, < 6.6.97>= 6.7, < 6.12.37>= 6.13, < 6.15.6= 6.16
Debian LinuxOperating system
Affected:= 11.0

CVSS 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 · scoped
Upgrade available Upgrade to 5.4.296 / 5.10.240 / 5.15.187 or later
Fixed in 5.4.2965.10.2405.15.187
Vendor patch git.kernel.org →
Recommended fix High confidence

Upgrade to kernel 5.4.296, 5.10.240, 5.15.187, or 6.1.144 or later stable release

  1. Identify the running kernel version using `uname -r`
  2. Check if the current version is affected: < 5.4.296, 5.5-5.10.239, 5.11-5.15.186, or 5.16-6.1.143
  3. For Debian 11 (bullseye), check for available kernel updates via `apt update && apt list --upgradable`
  4. Apply the vendor patch commit 27d07deea35ae67f2e75913242e25bdb7e1114e5 which replaces WARN_ON() with a printk message in drivers/net/wireless/ath/ath6kl/init.c
  5. Alternatively, update to a fixed kernel version: 5.4.296+, 5.10.240+, 5.15.187+, or 6.1.144+
Caveat Kernel upgrades may require system reboot and could introduce compatibility issues with proprietary kernel modules

Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.

We can perform the upgrade in your staging environment and verify nothing breaks — typical engagement from $1,600. Get the upgrade done

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References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.

Primary sources

Practitioner notes

Contributed

Peer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2025-38406 in production — separate from our analysis above.

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What this is

A place for practitioners to share what actually worked: a mitigation you’ve tested, a configuration change, a version- or environment-specific caveat, or a link to a verified patch. The most useful notes rise to the top as peers upvote them, so the signal stays high.

What belongs here
  • Verified mitigations, workarounds, and config changes
  • Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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