CVE-2025-37821 Information

Description

In the Linux kernel the following vulnerability has been resolved:

sched/eevdf: Fix se->slice being set to U64_MAX and resulting crash

There is a code path in dequeue_entities() that can set the slice of a sched_entity to U64_MAX which sometimes results in a crash.

The offending case is when dequeue_entities() is called to dequeue a delayed group entity and then the entity’s parent’s dequeue is delayed. In that case:

1. In the if (entity_is_task(se)) else block at the beginning of dequeue_entities() slice is set to cfs_rq_min_slice(group_cfs_rq(se)). If the entity was delayed then it has no queued tasks so cfs_rq_min_slice() returns U64_MAX.
2. The first for_each_sched_entity() loop dequeues the entity.
3. If the entity was its parent’s only child then the next iteration tries to dequeue the parent.
4. If the parent’s dequeue needs to be delayed then it breaks from the first for_each_sched_entity() loop without updating slice.
5. The second for_each_sched_entity() loop sets the parent’s ->slice to the saved slice which is still U64_MAX.

This throws off subsequent calculations with potentially catastrophic results. A manifestation we saw in production was:

6. In update_entity_lag() se->slice is used to calculate limit which ends up as a huge negative number.
7. limit is used in se->vlag = clamp(vlag -limit limit). Because limit is negative vlag > limit so se->vlag is set to the same huge negative number.
8. In place_entity() se->vlag is scaled which overflows and results in another huge (positive or negative) number.
9. The adjusted lag is subtracted from se->vruntime which increases or decreases se->vruntime by a huge number.
10. pick_eevdf() calls entity_eligible()/vruntime_eligible() which incorrectly returns false because the vruntime is so far from the other vruntimes on the queue causing the (vruntime - cfs_rq->min_vruntime) load calulation to overflow.
11. Nothing appears to be eligible so pick_eevdf() returns NULL.
12. pick_next_entity() tries to dereference the return value of pick_eevdf() and crashes.

Dumping the cfs_rq states from the core dumps with drgn showed tell-tale huge vruntime ranges and bogus vlag values and I also traced se->slice being set to U64_MAX on live systems (which was usually enign\ since the rest of the runqueue needed to be in a particular state to crash).

Fix it in dequeue_entities() by always setting slice from the first non-empty cfs_rq.

Reference

https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/50a665496881262519f115f1bfe5822f30580eb0 https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/bbce3de72be56e4b5f68924b7da9630cc89aa1a8