What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities
CVE-2021-47617: PCI: pciehp: Fix infinite loop in IRQ handler upon power fault
- 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: 2024-06-20 · updated 2026-06-17
- Weakness: CWE-835
Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: PCI: pciehp: Fix infinite loop in IRQ handler upon power fault The Power Fault Detected bit in the Slot Status register differs from all other hotplug events in that it is sticky: It can only be cleared after turning off slot power. Per PCIe r5.0, sec. 6.7.1.8: If a power controller detects a main power fault on the hot-plug slot, it must automatically set its internal main power fault latch [...]. The main power fault latch is cleared when software turns off power to the hot-plug slot. The stickiness used to cause interrupt storms and infinite loops which were fixed in 2009 by commits 5651c48cfafe ("PCI pciehp: fix power fault interrupt storm problem") and 99f0169c17f3 ("PCI: pciehp: enable software notification on empty slots"). Unfortunately in 2020 the infinite loop issue was inadvertently reintroduced by commit 8edf5332c393 ("PCI: pciehp: Fix MSI interrupt race"): The hardirq handler pciehp_isr() clears the PFD bit until pciehp's power_fault_detected flag is set. That happens in the IRQ thread pciehp_ist(), which never learns of the event because the hardirq handler is stuck in an infinite loop. Fix by setting the power_fault_detected flag already in the hardirq handler.
Affected products
- Linux kernel: from 4.19.149 before 4.19.233; from 5.4.69 before 5.4.177; from 5.7 before 5.10.97; from 5.11 before 5.15.20; from 5.16 before 5.16.6 — fixed in 4.19.233, 5.10.97, 5.15.20, 5.16.6, 5.4.177
How to fix
Upgrade to a fixed version: Linux kernel 4.19.233, 5.10.97, 5.15.20, 5.16.6. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.
References
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/1db58c6584a72102e98af2e600ea184ddaf2b8af
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/23584c1ed3e15a6f4bfab8dc5a88d94ab929ee12
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/3b4c966fb156ff3e70b2526d964952ff7c1574d9
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/464da38ba827f670deac6500a1de9a4f0f44c41d
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/6d6f1f0dac3e3441ecdb1103d4efb11b9ed24dd5
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/ff27f7d0333cff89ec85c419f431aca1b38fb16a
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/1db58c6584a72102e98af2e600ea184ddaf2b8af
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/23584c1ed3e15a6f4bfab8dc5a88d94ab929ee12
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/3b4c966fb156ff3e70b2526d964952ff7c1574d9
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/464da38ba827f670deac6500a1de9a4f0f44c41d
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/6d6f1f0dac3e3441ecdb1103d4efb11b9ed24dd5
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/ff27f7d0333cff89ec85c419f431aca1b38fb16a
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