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🛡️ CVE-2023-53103 — kernel

🟡 CVSS 5.5 — Medium ✅ No Known Exploit NVD
5.5
CVSS Score
0 Low4 Medium7 High9 Critical10

Description

bonding: restore bond's IFF_SLAVE flag if a non-eth dev enslave fails

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

bonding: restore bond's IFF_SLAVE flag if a non-eth dev enslave fails

syzbot reported a warning[1] where the bond device itself is a slave and

we try to enslave a non-ethernet device as the first slave which fails

but then in the error path when ether_setup() restores the bond device

it also clears all flags. In my previous fix[2] I restored the

IFF_MASTER flag, but I didn't consider the case that the bond device

itself might also be a slave with IFF_SLAVE set, so we need to restore

that flag as well. Use the bond_ether_setup helper which does the right

thing and restores the bond's flags properly.

Steps to reproduce using a nlmon dev:

$ ip l add nlmon0 type nlmon

$ ip l add bond1 type bond

$ ip l add bond2 type bond

$ ip l set bond1 master bond2

$ ip l set dev nlmon0 master bond1

$ ip -d l sh dev bond1

22: bond1: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,MASTER> mtu 1500 qdisc noqueue master bond2 state DOWN mode DEFAULT group default qlen 1000

(now bond1's IFF_SLAVE flag is gone and we'll hit a warning[3] if we

try to delete it)

[1] https://syzkaller.appspot.com/bug?id=391c7b1f6522182899efba27d891f1743e8eb3ef

[2] commit 7d5cd2ce5292 ("bonding: correctly handle bonding type change on enslave failure")

[3] example warning:

[ 27.008664] bond1: (slave nlmon0): The slave device specified does not support setting the MAC address

[ 27.008692] bond1: (slave nlmon0): Error -95 calling set_mac_address

[ 32.464639] bond1 (unregistering): Released all slaves

[ 32.464685] ------------[ cut here ]------------

[ 32.464686] WARNING: CPU: 1 PID: 2004 at net/core/dev.c:10829 unregister_netdevice_many+0x72a/0x780

[ 32.464694] Modules linked in: br_netfilter bridge bonding virtio_net

[ 32.464699] CPU: 1 PID: 2004 Comm: ip Kdump: loaded Not tainted 5.18.0-rc3+ #47

[ 32.464703] Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (Q35 + ICH9, 2009), BIOS 1.16.1-2.fc37 04/01/2014

[ 32.464704] RIP: 0010:unregister_netdevice_many+0x72a/0x780

[ 32.464707] Code: 99 fd ff ff ba 90 1a 00 00 48 c7 c6 f4 02 66 96 48 c7 c7 20 4d 35 96 c6 05 fa c7 2b 02 01 e8 be 6f 4a 00 0f 0b e9 73 fd ff ff <0f> 0b e9 5f fd ff ff 80 3d e3 c7 2b 02 00 0f 85 3b fd ff ff ba 59

[ 32.464710] RSP: 0018:ffffa006422d7820 EFLAGS: 00010206

[ 32.464712] RAX: ffff8f6e077140a0 RBX: ffffa006422d7888 RCX: 0000000000000000

[ 32.464714] RDX: ffff8f6e12edbe58 RSI: 0000000000000296 RDI: ffffffff96d4a520

[ 32.464716] RBP: ffff8f6e07714000 R08: ffffffff96d63600 R09: ffffa006422d7728

[ 32.464717] R10: 0000000000000ec0 R11: ffffffff9698c988 R12: ffff8f6e12edb140

[ 32.464719] R13: dead000000000122 R14: dead000000000100 R15: ffff8f6e12edb140

[ 32.464723] FS: 00007f297c2f1740(0000) GS:ffff8f6e5d900000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000

[ 32.464725] CS: 0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033

[ 32.464726] CR2: 00007f297bf1c800 CR3: 00000000115e8000 CR4: 0000000000350ee0

[ 32.464730] Call Trace:

[ 32.464763] <TASK>

[ 32.464767] rtnl_dellink+0x13e/0x380

[ 32.464776] ? cred_has_capability.isra.0+0x68/0x100

[ 32.464780] ? __rtnl_unlock+0x33/0x60

[ 32.464783] ? bpf_lsm_capset+0x10/0x10

[ 32.464786] ? security_capable+0x36/0x50

[ 32.464790] rtnetlink_rcv_msg+0x14e/0x3b0

[ 32.464792] ? _copy_to_iter+0xb1/0x790

[ 32.464796] ? post_alloc_hook+0xa0/0x160

[ 32.464799] ? rtnl_calcit.isra.0+0x110/0x110

[ 32.464802] netlink_rcv_skb+0x50/0xf0

[ 32.464806] netlink_unicast+0x216/0x340

[ 32.464809] netlink_sendmsg+0x23f/0x480

[ 32.464812] sock_sendmsg+0x5e/0x60

[ 32.464815] ____sys_sendmsg+0x22c/0x270

[ 32.464818] ? import_iovec+0x17/0x20

[ 32.464821] ? sendmsg_copy_msghdr+0x59/0x90

[ 32.464823] ? do_set_pte+0xa0/0xe0

[ 32.464828] ___sys_sendmsg+0x81/0xc0

[ 32.464832] ? mod_objcg_state+0xc6/0x300

[ 32.464835] ? refill_obj_stock+0xa9/0x160

[ 32.464838] ? memcg_slab_free_hook+0x1a5/0x1f0

[ 32.464842] __sys_sendm

---truncated---

How this vulnerability can be exploited

This issue can be reached with local access to the system, attack complexity is low, an attacker needs low-level privileges on the target. No user interaction is required. The scope is unchanged, so the impact stays within the vulnerable component. Rated impact: confidentiality none, integrity none, availability high.

CVSS metrics in full

The score comes from this vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

  • Attack vector: Local — a local account, shell or session on the host is needed.
  • Attack complexity: Low — the attack works reliably, with no preparation.
  • Privileges required: Low — an ordinary user account is enough.
  • User interaction: None — nobody has to be tricked into anything.
  • Scope: Unchanged — the damage stays inside the vulnerable component.
  • Confidentiality impact: None.
  • Integrity impact: None.
  • Availability impact: High — total loss, or loss the attacker controls.

Affected software

CVE-2023-53103 is recorded against 2 packages.

  • kernel (from 6.2.0 up to 6.2.8)
  • linux-kernel

Timeline and source

Published on 2 May 2025 and last revised on 12 August 2026. No public exploit is currently recorded for this entry. A vendor advisory or fix has been published. Record sourced from NVD.

References

git.kernel.org (Web)
git.kernel.org (Web)
git.kernel.org (Web)
git.kernel.org (Web)
github.com (Advisory)
nvd.nist.gov (Advisory)
git.kernel.org (Package)

Other advisories for this package

kernel has other advisories on record. If you are patching this one, these are worth checking on the same host:

CVE-2023-53103 on other distributions

Each distribution ships its own build and its own fixed version. Pick the one you run:

Details

Severity Medium
CVSS Score 5.5
CVSS Vector CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
CWE N/A
Public Exploit ✅ No
Source NVD
Published 2025-05-02
Updated 2026-08-20
Modified 2026-08-12

Affected Packages

Software From version Fixed in
kernel 6.2.0 6.2.8
linux-kernel — —

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