CVE-2025-38466

perf: Revert to requiring CAP_SYS_ADMIN for uprobes

State: Published
Severity: 7.8 High
Published: Jul 25, 2025
Updated: Oct 15, 2026
Reserved: Apr 16, 2025

Description

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

perf: Revert to requiring CAP_SYS_ADMIN for uprobes

Jann reports that uprobes can be used destructively when used in the middle of an instruction. The kernel only verifies there is a valid instruction at the requested offset, but due to variable instruction length cannot determine if this is an instruction as seen by the intended execution stream.

Additionally, Mark Rutland notes that on architectures that mix data in the text segment (like arm64), a similar things can be done if the data word is 'mistaken' for an instruction.

As such, require CAP_SYS_ADMIN for uprobes.

Scores

CVSS	Score	Vector	Source
3.1	7.8 High	CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H	Linux

Weaknesses

The record names no weakness.

Affected Products

Product	Versions
LinuxLinux	c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before d7ef1afd5b3f43f4924326164cee5397b66abd9cAffected c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before c0aec35f861fa746ca45aa816161c74352e6ada8Affected c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before 8e8bf7bc6aa6f583336c2fda280b6cea0aed5612Affected c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before 183bdb89af1b5193b1d1d9316986053b15ca6fa4Affected c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before a0a8009083e569b5526c64f7d3f2a62baca95164Affected c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before d5074256b642cdeb46a70ce2f15193e766edca68Affected c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before ba677dbe77af5ffe6204e0f3f547f3ba059c6302Affected
LinuxLinux	5.8Affected before 5.8Not affected 5.10.240 through 5.10.Not affected 5.15.189 through 5.15.Not affected 6.1.146 through 6.1.Not affected 6.6.99 through 6.6.Not affected 6.12.39 through 6.12.Not affected 6.15.7 through 6.15.Not affected 6.16 and laterNot affected

Product

Versions

LinuxLinux

c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before d7ef1afd5b3f43f4924326164cee5397b66abd9cAffected
c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before c0aec35f861fa746ca45aa816161c74352e6ada8Affected
c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before 8e8bf7bc6aa6f583336c2fda280b6cea0aed5612Affected
c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before 183bdb89af1b5193b1d1d9316986053b15ca6fa4Affected
c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before a0a8009083e569b5526c64f7d3f2a62baca95164Affected
c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before d5074256b642cdeb46a70ce2f15193e766edca68Affected
c9e0924e5c2b59365f9c0d43ff8722e79ecf4088 to before ba677dbe77af5ffe6204e0f3f547f3ba059c6302Affected

LinuxLinux

5.8Affected
before 5.8Not affected
5.10.240 through 5.10.*Not affected
5.15.189 through 5.15.*Not affected
6.1.146 through 6.1.*Not affected
6.6.99 through 6.6.*Not affected
6.12.39 through 6.12.*Not affected
6.15.7 through 6.15.*Not affected
6.16 and laterNot affected

References

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