CVE-2022-50731

crypto: akcipher - default implementation for setting a private key

State
Published
Severity
Not scored
Published
Dec 24, 2025
Updated
May 11, 2026
Reserved
Dec 24, 2025

Read the record on cve.org

Description

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

crypto: akcipher - default implementation for setting a private key

Changes from v1: * removed the default implementation from set_pub_key: it is assumed that an implementation must always have this callback defined as there are no use case for an algorithm, which doesn't need a public key

Many akcipher implementations (like ECDSA) support only signature verifications, so they don't have all callbacks defined.

Commit 78a0324f4a53 ("crypto: akcipher - default implementations for request callbacks") introduced default callbacks for sign/verify operations, which just return an error code.

However, these are not enough, because before calling sign the caller would likely call set_priv_key first on the instantiated transform (as the in-kernel testmgr does). This function does not have a default stub, so the kernel crashes, when trying to set a private key on an akcipher, which doesn't support signature generation.

I've noticed this, when trying to add a KAT vector for ECDSA signature to the testmgr.

With this patch the testmgr returns an error in dmesg (as it should) instead of crashing the kernel NULL ptr dereference.

Scores

The record has no CVSS score.

Weaknesses

The record names no weakness.

Affected Products

ProductVersions
LinuxLinux
  • 78a0324f4a5328088fea9426cfe1d1851276c475 to before 95c4e20adc3ea00d1594a2a05d9b187ed12ffa8eAffected
  • 78a0324f4a5328088fea9426cfe1d1851276c475 to before a1354bdd191d533211b7cb723aa76a66f516f197Affected
  • 78a0324f4a5328088fea9426cfe1d1851276c475 to before 779a9930f3e152c82699feb389a0e6d6644e747eAffected
  • 78a0324f4a5328088fea9426cfe1d1851276c475 to before 85bc736a18b872f54912e8bb70682d11770aece0Affected
  • 78a0324f4a5328088fea9426cfe1d1851276c475 to before f9058178597059d6307efe96a7916600f8ede08cAffected
  • 78a0324f4a5328088fea9426cfe1d1851276c475 to before bc155c6c188c2f0c5749993b1405673d25a80389Affected
LinuxLinux
  • 5.2Affected
  • before 5.2Not affected
  • 5.4.220 through 5.4.*Not affected
  • 5.10.150 through 5.10.*Not affected
  • 5.15.75 through 5.15.*Not affected
  • 5.19.17 through 5.19.*Not affected
  • 6.0.3 through 6.0.*Not affected
  • 6.1 and laterNot affected

References

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