In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
media: tuner: xc5000: Fix use-after-free in xc5000_release
The original code uses cancel_delayed_work() in xc5000_release(), which does not guarantee that the delayed work item timer_sleep has fully completed if it was already running. This leads to use-after-free scenarios where xc5000_release() may free the xc5000_priv while timer_sleep is still active and attempts to dereference the xc5000_priv.
A typical race condition is illustrated below:
CPU 0 (release thread) | CPU 1 (delayed work callback) xc5000_release() | xc5000_do_timer_sleep() cancel_delayed_work() | hybrid_tuner_release_state(priv) | kfree(priv) | | priv = container_of() // UAF
Replace cancel_delayed_work() with cancel_delayed_work_sync() to ensure that the timer_sleep is properly canceled before the xc5000_priv memory is deallocated.
A deadlock concern was considered: xc5000_release() is called in a process context and is not holding any locks that the timer_sleep work item might also need. Therefore, the use of the _sync() variant is safe here.
This bug was initially identified through static analysis.
[hverkuil: fix typo in Subject: tunner -> tuner]