A flaw was found in the Linux kernel's implementation of biovecs in versions before 5.9-rc7. A zero-length biovec request issued by the block subsystem could cause the kernel to enter an infinite loop, causing a denial of service. This flaw allows a local attacker with basic privileges to issue requests to a block device, resulting in a denial of service. The highest threat from this vulnerability is to system availability.
CVE-2020-25641
Score 5.5 from GitHub Security Advisory published 2022-05-24. NVD baseline CVSS 5.5; sources differ by 0.0.
- Lower severity and no public exploit yet
A fix is available — apply it.
- CVSS v3
- 5.5
- EG Score
- 5.5(medium)
- EG Risk
- —
- EPSS
- 31.1%
- KEV
- Not listed
Published
October 6, 2020
Last Modified
November 21, 2024
References (18)
- secalert@redhathttp://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2020-10/msg00021.html
- secalert@redhathttp://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2020-10/msg00042.html
- secalert@redhathttp://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2020/10/06/9
- secalert@redhathttps://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1881424
- secalert@redhathttps://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=7e24969022cbd61ddc586f14824fc205661bb124
- secalert@redhathttps://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2020/10/msg00032.html
- secalert@redhathttps://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2020/10/msg00034.html
- secalert@redhathttps://usn.ubuntu.com/4576-1/
- secalert@redhathttps://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/block/biovecs.html
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2020-10/msg00021.html
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2020-10/msg00042.html
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2020/10/06/9
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1881424
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=7e24969022cbd61ddc586f14824fc205661bb124
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2020/10/msg00032.html
Vendor Advisories for CVE-2020-25641(2)
These vendors published their own advisory mentioning this CVE — often with vendor-specific remediation steps + affected product lists not in NVD.
Patch Availability(9)
| Vendor / Ecosystem | Fixed in / Patch | Released | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| ubuntu | linux-image-virtual-hwe-20.04 (5.4.0.51.54) @ focal | 2026-05-23 | ubuntu |
| ubuntu | linux-image-virtual-hwe-16.04-edge (4.15.0.126.125) @ xenial | 2026-05-23 | ubuntu |
| ubuntu | linux-image-oem-20.04 (5.6.0.1048.44) @ focal | 2026-05-23 | ubuntu |
| redhat | kernel-rt-0:4.18.0-193.40.1.rt13.90.el8_2 | 2021-01-14 | redhat |
| redhat | kernel-0:4.18.0-193.40.1.el8_2 | 2021-01-12 | redhat |
| redhat | kernel-0:4.18.0-147.34.1.el8_1 | 2020-12-08 | redhat |
| redhat | kernel-alt-0:4.14.0-115.33.1.el7a | 2020-11-10 | redhat |
| redhat | kernel-0:4.18.0-240.el8 | 2020-11-04 | redhat |
| redhat | kernel-rt-0:4.18.0-240.rt7.54.el8 | 2020-11-04 | redhat |
Patches are aggregated from vendor advisories (Red Hat, Microsoft, Cisco, GitHub) and package ecosystems (OSV, GHSA). Multiple rows for the same upstream release have been deduplicated.
Weakness Classification(1)
MITRE Common Weakness Enumeration — the root-cause categories this CVE belongs to.
Additional Vendor Advisories
(8)
Vendors that published advisories for this CVE beyond the curated set above. Broader coverage but minimal per-row detail — click through for the original advisory.
- Microsoft MSRCCVE-2020-256412020-10-09
A flaw was found in the Linux kernel's implementation of biovecs in versions before 5.9-rc7. A zero-length biovec request issued by the block subsystem could cause the kernel to enter an infinite loop causing a denial of service. This flaw allows a local attacker with basic privileges to issue requests to a block device resulting in a denial of service. The highest threat from this vulnerability is to system availability.
- Red HatRHSA-2020:5079MODERATE2020-09-30
RHSA-2020:5079 — Moderate
- Red HatRHSA-2020:5374MODERATE2020-09-30
RHSA-2020:5374 — Moderate
- Red HatRHSA-2021:0073MODERATE2020-09-30
RHSA-2021:0073 — Moderate
- Red HatRHSA-2021:0136MODERATE2020-09-30
RHSA-2021:0136 — Moderate
- UbuntuUSN-4576-1MEDIUM
Linux kernel vulnerabilities
- UbuntuUSN-4660-1MEDIUM
Linux kernel vulnerabilities
- UbuntuUSN-4752-1MEDIUM
Linux kernel (OEM) vulnerabilities
Data Freshness Timeline
(refreshed 11× in last 7d / 45× in last 30d)
Each row is a source pipeline that fetched or updated this CVE on that date, with what changed. For example, "NVD update" means NVD published or revised its analysis for this CVE; "MITRE cvelistV5" means we ingested or refreshed it from the CNA feed. Most recent first.
- 2026-07-22 22:37 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-22 14:05 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-21 15:22 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-07-13 06:10 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-07-13 01:38 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-07-12 05:44 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-07-09 19:07 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-07-07 13:43 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-07-06 16:25 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-06-24 14:03 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-24 14:03 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-24 11:20 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-06-23 21:31 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-06-14 23:15 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-06-08 14:15 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-08 14:15 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-07 15:39 UTCOSV refresh
- 2026-06-06 13:45 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-06 13:45 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-05 22:45 UTCEPSS rescore
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- 2026-05-24 16:48 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-05-23 06:59 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-05-23 06:59 UTCVendor advisory
- 2026-05-23 06:59 UTCGHSA enrichment
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Frequently asked(5)
What is CVE-2020-25641?
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