5.5

CVE-2021-47408: netfilter: conntrack: serialize hash resizes and cleanups

Analyzed
AliasesUBUNTU-CVE-2021-47408DEBIAN-CVE-2021-47408
Published 21-05-2024Last modified 11-05-2026

Vulnerability summary

CVE-2021-47408 is a medium (CVSS 5.5) vulnerability in linux. EPSS estimates a 0.25% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 16.8% of scored vulnerabilities.

Priority
Routine

Not severe (CVSS 4.7, local access); no exploitation reported by the 5 checked sources

Source freshness unavailable

How is this decided?
CVSS score
5.5/10
010
Medium · v3.1 (NVD)
EPSS score
0.25%
0%100%
Low · 0.00 pp in 30 days
KEVNot listedNot listed by any tracked catalog.
RansomwareNot flaggedNo ransomware use recorded.
Public exploits0No public exploits recorded

Advisory lineage

Upstream 0 · Downstream 8 · Related 6

Timeline

  1. 21-05-2024
    PublishedVulnerability first disclosed.
  2. 11-05-2026
    Last modifiedVulnerability information updated.

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: netfilter: conntrack: serialize hash resizes and cleanups Syzbot was able to trigger the following warning [1] No repro found by syzbot yet but I was able to trigger similar issue by having 2 scripts running in parallel, changing conntrack hash sizes, and: for j in `seq 1 1000` ; do unshare -n /bin/true >/dev/null ; done It would take more than 5 minutes for net_namespace structures to be cleaned up. This is because nf_ct_iterate_cleanup() has to restart everytime a resize happened. By adding a mutex, we can serialize hash resizes and cleanups and also make get_next_corpse() faster by skipping over empty buckets. Even without resizes in the picture, this patch considerably speeds up network namespace dismantles. [1] INFO: task syz-executor.0:8312 can't die for more than 144 seconds. task:syz-executor.0 state:R running task stack:25672 pid: 8312 ppid: 6573 flags:0x00004006 Call Trace: context_switch kernel/sched/core.c:4955 [inline] __schedule+0x940/0x26f0 kernel/sched/core.c:6236 preempt_schedule_common+0x45/0xc0 kernel/sched/core.c:6408 preempt_schedule_thunk+0x16/0x18 arch/x86/entry/thunk_64.S:35 __local_bh_enable_ip+0x109/0x120 kernel/softirq.c:390 local_bh_enable include/linux/bottom_half.h:32 [inline] get_next_corpse net/netfilter/nf_conntrack_core.c:2252 [inline] nf_ct_iterate_cleanup+0x15a/0x450 net/netfilter/nf_conntrack_core.c:2275 nf_conntrack_cleanup_net_list+0x14c/0x4f0 net/netfilter/nf_conntrack_core.c:2469 ops_exit_list+0x10d/0x160 net/core/net_namespace.c:171 setup_net+0x639/0xa30 net/core/net_namespace.c:349 copy_net_ns+0x319/0x760 net/core/net_namespace.c:470 create_new_namespaces+0x3f6/0xb20 kernel/nsproxy.c:110 unshare_nsproxy_namespaces+0xc1/0x1f0 kernel/nsproxy.c:226 ksys_unshare+0x445/0x920 kernel/fork.c:3128 __do_sys_unshare kernel/fork.c:3202 [inline] __se_sys_unshare kernel/fork.c:3200 [inline] __x64_sys_unshare+0x2d/0x40 kernel/fork.c:3200 do_syscall_x64 arch/x86/entry/common.c:50 [inline] do_syscall_64+0x35/0xb0 arch/x86/entry/common.c:80 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x44/0xae RIP: 0033:0x7f63da68e739 RSP: 002b:00007f63d7c05188 EFLAGS: 00000246 ORIG_RAX: 0000000000000110 RAX: ffffffffffffffda RBX: 00007f63da792f80 RCX: 00007f63da68e739 RDX: 0000000000000000 RSI: 0000000000000000 RDI: 0000000040000000 RBP: 00007f63da6e8cc4 R08: 0000000000000000 R09: 0000000000000000 R10: 0000000000000000 R11: 0000000000000246 R12: 00007f63da792f80 R13: 00007fff50b75d3f R14: 00007f63d7c05300 R15: 0000000000022000 Showing all locks held in the system: 1 lock held by khungtaskd/27: #0: ffffffff8b980020 (rcu_read_lock){....}-{1:2}, at: debug_show_all_locks+0x53/0x260 kernel/locking/lockdep.c:6446 2 locks held by kworker/u4:2/153: #0: ffff888010c69138 ((wq_completion)events_unbound){+.+.}-{0:0}, at: arch_atomic64_set arch/x86/include/asm/atomic64_64.h:34 [inline] #0: ffff888010c69138 ((wq_completion)events_unbound){+.+.}-{0:0}, at: arch_atomic_long_set include/linux/atomic/atomic-long.h:41 [inline] #0: ffff888010c69138 ((wq_completion)events_unbound){+.+.}-{0:0}, at: atomic_long_set include/linux/atomic/atomic-instrumented.h:1198 [inline] #0: ffff888010c69138 ((wq_completion)events_unbound){+.+.}-{0:0}, at: set_work_data kernel/workqueue.c:634 [inline] #0: ffff888010c69138 ((wq_completion)events_unbound){+.+.}-{0:0}, at: set_work_pool_and_clear_pending kernel/workqueue.c:661 [inline] #0: ffff888010c69138 ((wq_completion)events_unbound){+.+.}-{0:0}, at: process_one_work+0x896/0x1690 kernel/workqueue.c:2268 #1: ffffc9000140fdb0 ((kfence_timer).work){+.+.}-{0:0}, at: process_one_work+0x8ca/0x1690 kernel/workqueue.c:2272 1 lock held by systemd-udevd/2970: 1 lock held by in:imklog/6258: #0: ffff88807f970ff0 (&f->f_pos_lock){+.+.}-{3:3}, at: __fdget_pos+0xe9/0x100 fs/file.c:990 3 locks held by kworker/1:6/8158: 1 lock held by syz-executor.0/8312: 2 locks held by kworker/u4:13/9320: 1 lock held by ---truncated---

CVSS metrics

5 scores · 4 sources · 2 versions

EPSS trend

Probability

0.25%

Chance of exploitation in the next 30 days

Percentile

17%

Versus all other CVEs

30-day change

No change 0.00 pp

From 0.25% on 04-10-2026

04-10-202603-11-2026

Known exploited

Compare KEV catalogs
CISA KEV

Not in the CISA KEV catalog.

ENISA CNW

Not in the ENISA CNW catalog.

CIRCL

Not in the CIRCL catalog.

Public exploits

0 found

No public exploits indexed.

Weaknesses

CWE · root cause

No weakness data has been published for this record.

Affected systems

Version check

Known conditions: local access, low-privilege account, no user interaction (CVSS vector). Other conditions: not stated in public data.

Ubuntu91 products
  • linuxAll versions (No fix recorded)
  • linux-allwinner-5.19All versions (No fix recorded)
  • linux-awsAll versions (No fix recorded)
  • linux-aws-5.0All versions (No fix recorded)
  • linux-aws-5.11All versions (No fix recorded)
Linux2 products
  • linux≥ 0d02d5646eb84403766a11a1d3b19e670a3d45d5, < e2d192301a0df8160d1555b66ae8611e8050e424 | ≥ 0d02d5646eb84403766a11a1d3b19e670a3d45d5, < 7ea6f5848281182ce0cff6cafdcf3fbdeb8ca7e1 | ≥ 0d02d5646eb84403766a11a1d3b19e670a3d45d5, < e9edc188fc76499b0b9bd60364084037f6d03773 | 4.13
  • linux_kernel< 5.10.71 | ≥ 5.11, < 5.14.10 | 5.15:rc1 | 5.15:rc2 | 5.15:rc3
Debian1 product
  • linux< 5.14.12-1

3 vendors · 94 products

References

7 links