What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities

CVE-2021-47579: ovl: fix warning in ovl_create_real()

• Severity: medium (CVSS 5.5 v3.1)
• Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
• EPSS: 0.2% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
• Public exploit or detection template: none known
• Published: 2024-06-19 · updated 2026-06-17

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: ovl: fix warning in ovl_create_real() Syzbot triggered the following warning in ovl_workdir_create() -> ovl_create_real(): if (!err && WARN_ON(!newdentry->d_inode)) { The reason is that the cgroup2 filesystem returns from mkdir without instantiating the new dentry. Weird filesystems such as this will be rejected by overlayfs at a later stage during setup, but to prevent such a warning, call ovl_mkdir_real() directly from ovl_workdir_create() and reject this case early.

Affected products

• Linux kernel: before 4.19.222; from 4.20 before 5.4.168; from 5.5 before 5.10.88; from 5.11 before 5.15.11 — fixed in 4.19.222, 5.10.88, 5.15.11, 5.4.168

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: Linux kernel 4.19.222, 5.10.88, 5.15.11, 5.4.168. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/1f5573cfe7a7056e80a92c7a037a3e69f3a13d1c
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/445d2dc63e5871d218f21b8f62ab29ac72f2e6b8
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/6859985a2fbda5d1586bf44538853e1be69e85f7
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/d2ccdd4e4efab06178608a34d7bfb20a54104c02
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/f9f300a92297be8250547347fd52216ef0177ae0
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/1f5573cfe7a7056e80a92c7a037a3e69f3a13d1c
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/445d2dc63e5871d218f21b8f62ab29ac72f2e6b8
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/6859985a2fbda5d1586bf44538853e1be69e85f7
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/d2ccdd4e4efab06178608a34d7bfb20a54104c02
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/f9f300a92297be8250547347fd52216ef0177ae0

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