Cloudanix VulnDB

CVE-2025-68184

None

CVSS

—

EPSS

0.1%

Published

Dec 16, 2025

CISA due date

—

Cloudanix analysis

Schedule a fix SSVC: Track

A bug in the Linux kernel can cause screens on certain Mediatek devices to freeze or display corrupted images when running graphics programs.

Exploitation
Requires User Interaction
Attacker needs
Local User
Complexity
Low
Impact
Denial Of Service
Component
OS kernel
Class
Denial of service
Remediation
Patch
Effort
Low
Patch risk
Low

What it actually does

The flaw enables broken AFBC support in the Mediatek DRM driver on MT8188 hardware, resulting in repeated vblank timeouts during atomic commits and garbled rendering output.

Why it matters to the business

Affected devices experience display instability or unresponsiveness, disrupting operations on Mediatek-based platforms and requiring urgent kernel updates across deployed systems.

How an attack unfolds

Graphics applications trigger AFBC usage by default with recent Mesa versions, causing the kernel's atomic commit path to hang on vblank waits and produce denial-of-service conditions via repeated timeouts.

How to fix it

Apply the upstream fix disabling AFBC support, present in commit df1ad5de2197ea1b527d13ae7b699e9ee7d724d4. For consul-fips-1.19 packages upgrade to 1.19.2-r6 or newer.

How to confirm the fix worked

Confirm presence of the disabling commit in the running kernel, reproduce graphics workloads on MT8188 hardware, and verify absence of vblank timeout warnings in dmesg.

Typical attack path

  1. Run graphics workloads that invoke AFBC modifiers on MT8188 hardware
  2. Kernel enters drm_atomic_helper_commit_tail_rpm and waits for vblanks
  3. vblank timeout triggers warnings and garbled output, degrading system availability

How to detect it

Search kernel logs for repeated vblank timeout warnings and stack traces involving drm_atomic_helper_wait_for_vblanks on Mediatek platforms; correlate with Mesa version 25.0 or later.

  • vblank wait timed out
  • drm_atomic_helper_wait_for_vblanks.part.0
  • WARNING: CPU:.* at drivers/gpu/drm/drm_atomic_helper.c:1835

What your security team should do

  • Prioritize kernel upgrades to the listed fixed commits within the next maintenance window
  • Disable AFBC via driver parameters where immediate patching is not feasible
  • Monitor kernel logs on Mediatek hardware for atomic helper timeout events

The record

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: drm/mediatek: Disable AFBC support on Mediatek DRM driver Commit c410fa9b07c3 ("drm/mediatek: Add AFBC support to Mediatek DRM driver") added AFBC support to Mediatek DRM and enabled the 32x8/split/sparse modifier. However, this is currently broken on Mediatek MT8188 (Genio 700 EVK platform); tested using upstream Kernel and Mesa (v25.2.1), AFBC is used by default since Mesa v25.0. Kernel trace reports vblank timeouts constantly, and the render is garbled: ``` [CRTC:62:crtc-0] vblank wait timed out WARNING: CPU: 7 PID: 70 at drivers/gpu/drm/drm_atomic_helper.c:1835 drm_atomic_helper_wait_for_vblanks.part.0+0x24c/0x27c [...] Hardware name: MediaTek Genio-700 EVK (DT) Workqueue: events_unbound commit_work pstate: 60400009 (nZCv daif +PAN -UAO -TCO -DIT -SSBS BTYPE=--) pc : drm_atomic_helper_wait_for_vblanks.part.0+0x24c/0x27c lr : drm_atomic_helper_wait_for_vblanks.part.0+0x24c/0x27c sp : ffff80008337bca0 x29: ffff80008337bcd0 x28: 0000000000000061 x27: 0000000000000000 x26: 0000000000000001 x25: 0000000000000000 x24: ffff0000c9dcc000 x23: 0000000000000001 x22: 0000000000000000 x21: ffff0000c66f2f80 x20: ffff0000c0d7d880 x19: 0000000000000000 x18: 000000000000000a x17: 000000040044ffff x16: 005000f2b5503510 x15: 0000000000000000 x14: 0000000000000000 x13: 74756f2064656d69 x12: 742074696177206b x11: 0000000000000058 x10: 0000000000000018 x9 : ffff800082396a70 x8 : 0000000000057fa8 x7 : 0000000000000cce x6 : ffff8000823eea70 x5 : ffff0001fef5f408 x4 : ffff80017ccee000 x3 : ffff0000c12cb480 x2 : 0000000000000000 x1 : 0000000000000000 x0 : ffff0000c12cb480 Call trace: drm_atomic_helper_wait_for_vblanks.part.0+0x24c/0x27c (P) drm_atomic_helper_commit_tail_rpm+0x64/0x80 commit_tail+0xa4/0x1a4 commit_work+0x14/0x20 process_one_work+0x150/0x290 worker_thread+0x2d0/0x3ec kthread+0x12c/0x210 ret_from_fork+0x10/0x20 ---[ end trace 0000000000000000 ]--- ``` Until this gets fixed upstream, disable AFBC support on this platform, as it's currently broken with upstream Mesa.

Affected packages

Ecosystem Package Introduced Fixed
Linux Kernel 6.2.0 6.6.117
Mageia:9 kernel 0 6.6.120-1.mga9
Mageia:9 kernel-linus 0 6.6.120-1.mga9
Mageia:9 kmod-virtualbox 0 7.1.14-14.mga9
Mageia:9 kmod-xtables-addons 0 3.24-88.mga9
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 dtb-aarch64 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 kernel-64kb 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 kernel-azure 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 kernel-default 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 kernel-default-base 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1.160000.2.6
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 kernel-docs 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 kernel-kvmsmall 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 kernel-obs-build 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 kernel-obs-qa 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 kernel-rt 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 kernel-source 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 kernel-syms 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1
openSUSE:Leap 16.0 kernel-zfcpdump 0 6.12.0-160000.9.1

Related vulnerabilities