Linux vulnerability

What happened

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: tty: serial: 8250: protect against NULL uart->port.dev in register serial8250_register_8250_port() conditionally copies uart->port.dev from up->port.dev only when up->port.dev is non-NULL: if (up->port.dev) { uart->port.dev = up->port.dev; ... } So if both the existing uart slot and up have a NULL ->dev, uart->port.dev remains NULL. The very next ACPI companion check then dereferences it unconditionally: if (!has_acpi_companion(uart->port.dev)) { has_acpi_companion() reads dev->fwnode without a NULL guard (include/linux/acpi.h), so this NULL-derefs the kernel for the remaining no-dev case rather than just skipping the mctrl_gpio_init() initialisation as intended. smatch flags the inconsistency: drivers/tty/serial/8250/8250_core.c:767 serial8250_register_8250_port() error: 'uart->port.dev' could be null (see line 719) Guard the call with a NULL check so register continues to work for callers that legitimately have no parent device (legacy non-OF/non-ACPI registrations). No functional change for callers that pass a non-NULL ->dev.

Affected versions

Linux: 4a96895f74c9633b51427fd080ab70fa62b65bc4 through before 5cbab666721d974bfe033a12045d808936deaefd (git); 4a96895f74c9633b51427fd080ab70fa62b65bc4 through before 941c9f84c9b6310f7aaa1c8c785dcc634ee33050 (git); 5.3 Fixed: See vendor advisory.

Why it matters

Review the vendor advisory and exposure of the affected product to determine operational impact.

Detection & mitigation

• Apply vendor-provided updates or mitigations.
• Review affected product exposure and access logs.