dmaengine: xilinx_dma: Fix CPU stall in xilinx_dma_poll_timeout
Key facts
- Attack vector
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- Privileges required
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- User interaction
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- Attack complexity
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- Impact type
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- Confidentiality · integrity · availability
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- Fix status
- Fixed
No CVSS vector from any source. Fix status from CNA.
Summary
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: dmaengine: xilinx_dma: Fix CPU stall in xilinx_dma_poll_timeout Currently when calling xilinx_dma_poll_timeout with delay_us=0 and a condition that is never fulfilled, the CPU busy-waits for prolonged time and the timeout triggers only with a massive delay causing a CPU stall. This happens due to a huge underestimation of wall clock time in poll_timeout_us_atomic. Commit 7349a69cf312 ("iopoll: Do not use timekeeping in read_poll_timeout_atomic()") changed the behavior to no longer use ktime_get at the expense of underestimation of wall clock time which appears to be very large for delay_us=0. Instead of timing out after approximately XILINX_DMA_LOOP_COUNT microseconds, the timeout takes XILINX_DMA_LOOP_COUNT * 1000 * (time that the overhead of the for loop in poll_timeout_us_atomic takes) which is in the range of several minutes for XILINX_DMA_LOOP_COUNT=1000000. Fix this by using a non-zero value for delay_us. Use delay_us=10 to keep the delay in the hot path of starting DMA transfers minimal but still avoid CPU stalls in case of unexpected hardware failures. One-off measurement with delay_us=0 causes the cpu to busy wait around 7 minutes in the timeout case. After applying this patch with delay_us=10 the measured timeout was 1053428 microseconds which is roughly equivalent to the expected 1000000 microseconds specified in XILINX_DMA_LOOP_COUNT. Add a constant XILINX_DMA_POLL_DELAY_US for delay_us value.
Why it matters now
SSVC decision points
Not available: CISA has not published SSVC decision points for this record.
Affected products
Remediation
- Fix · CNA Linux (Linux) Fixed in 6.1.191, 6.6.160, 6.12.114, 6.18.57, 7.2.6, 7.3
Vendor assessments
Red Hat
Red Hat rating: Moderate. Red Hat's page for this CVE →
Not affected: 7 products
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9
- Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4
- Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 5
Timeline
- 2026-10-02 Threatist record created from CVE-2026-93168
- 2026-10-03 Alias added: GHSA-r3mw-x3xp-fjpr
- 2026-10-16 Fix available: Linux/[email protected], Linux/Linux@f786e7b3adbf3bd14964a1cedf9d55b6ad91dcd7 · CNA
- 2026-10-16 1 new reference · CNA
- 2026-10-19 Fix available: Linux/[email protected] · CNA
- 2026-10-21 Affected versions changed · Red Hat
- 2026-10-21 CVSS score added · Red Hat
- 2026-10-21 Fix available: Linux/Linux@2ba67aa183a3ce174d534425b67eda84f6e3c896, Linux/[email protected], Linux/[email protected] +1 · CNA
- 2026-10-21 2 new references · CNA
- 2026-10-30 Fix available: Linux/Linux@4237b5cc181a17f5a2a797655c1ce2c64e01c550, Linux/[email protected] · CNA
- 2026-10-30 1 new reference · CNA
- 2026-11-06 Affected versions changed · Red Hat
References
Other 6
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/4237b5cc181a17f5a2a797655c1ce2c64e01c550
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/2ba67aa183a3ce174d534425b67eda84f6e3c896
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/c30a26d4987a01e619449bf170f584c007e07d75
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/f786e7b3adbf3bd14964a1cedf9d55b6ad91dcd7
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/8b5654d317277e6e505c23f8fa7e415237fefc7f
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/aa99c4d1d63bbc26a5fc4c667d89b2595743c19d
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Sources
- CVE-2026-93168 · CVE Program
- CVE-2026-93168 · NVD
- FIRST EPSS
- GHSA-r3mw-x3xp-fjpr · GitHub Advisory Database · CC BY 4.0
- CVE-2026-93168 · Red Hat security data · CC BY 4.0
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