CVE-2021-3491

medium
Published — · Modified —
CVSS v3
CVSS v2
VIR risk
5.5

Description

The io_uring subsystem in the Linux kernel allowed the MAX_RW_COUNT limit to be bypassed in the PROVIDE_BUFFERS operation, which led to negative values being usedin mem_rw when reading /proc/<PID>/mem. This could be used to create a heap overflow leading to arbitrary code execution in the kernel. It was addressed via commit d1f82808877b ("io_uring: truncate lengths larger than MAX_RW_COUNT on provide buffers") (v5.13-rc1) and backported to the stable kernels in v5.12.4, v5.11.21, and v5.10.37. It was introduced in ddf0322db79c ("io_uring: add IORING_OP_PROVIDE_BUFFERS") (v5.7-rc1).

Predictions

Exploit likelihood
20%
Patch ETA

Heuristic predictions, AS-IS, for prioritization only.

Mitigations

vendor Authored 2026-05-27

Vendor advisory: debian — https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2021-3491

vendor Authored 2026-05-27

Vendor advisory: suse — https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2021-3491.html

OS impact

OSVersionStatusFixed in
arch archfixed5.10.37-1
suse slesaffected
debian debianbookwormfixed5.10.38-1
debian debianbullseyefixed5.10.38-1
debian debianforkyfixed5.10.38-1
debian debiansidfixed5.10.38-1
debian debiantrixiefixed5.10.38-1

References

Verify integrity in audit chain (admin only). AS-IS.