CVE-2023-53991

CVE-2023-53991 is a security vulnerability that is still awaiting full analysis and scoring. It is not currently listed as actively exploited by CISA, and its EPSS exploit-prediction score is low.

Key facts

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: drm/msm/dpu: Disallow unallocated resources to be returned In the event that the topology requests resources that have not been created by the system (because they are typically not represented in dpu_mdss_cfg ^1), the resource(s) in global_state (in this case DSC blocks, until their allocation/assignment is being sanity-checked in "drm/msm/dpu: Reject topologies for which no DSC blocks are available") remain NULL but will still be returned out of dpu_rm_get_assigned_resources, where the caller expects to get an array containing num_blks valid pointers (but instead gets these NULLs). To prevent this from happening, where null-pointer dereferences typically result in a hard-to-debug platform lockup, num_blks shouldn't increase past NULL blocks and will print an error and break instead. After all, max_blks represents the static size of the maximum number of blocks whereas the actual amount varies per platform. ^1: which can happen after a git rebase ended up moving additions to _dpu_cfg to a different struct which has the same patch context. Patchwork: https://patchwork.freedesktop.org/patch/517636/

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2023-53991?
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: drm/msm/dpu: Disallow unallocated resources to be returned In the event that the topology requests resources that have not been created by the system (because they are typically not represented in dpu_mdss_cfg ^1), the resource(s) in global_state (in this case DSC blocks, until their allocation/assignment is being sanity-checked in "drm/msm/dpu: Reject topologies for which no DSC blocks are available") remain NULL but will still be returned out of dpu_rm_get_assigned_resources, where the caller expects to get an array containing num_blks valid pointers (but instead gets these NULLs). To prevent this from happening, where null-pointer dereferences typically result in a hard-to-debug platform lockup, num_blks shouldn't increase past NULL blocks and will print an error and break instead. After all, max_blks represents the static size of the maximum number of blocks whereas the actual amount varies per platform. ^1: which can happen after a git rebase ended up moving additions to _dpu_cfg to a different struct which has the same patch context. Patchwork: https://patchwork.freedesktop.org/patch/517636/
Is CVE-2023-53991 being actively exploited?
It is not currently listed in CISA's KEV catalog. Its EPSS exploit-prediction score is 0% (6th percentile), an estimate of the probability of exploitation in the next 30 days.
How do I fix CVE-2023-53991?
Review the linked vendor and NVD advisories for patched versions and mitigations, then upgrade or apply the recommended workaround.
Does CVE-2023-53991 have an EU (EUVD) identifier?
Yes. CVE-2023-53991 is tracked in the ENISA EU Vulnerability Database (EUVD) as EUVD-2025-205155.
When was CVE-2023-53991 published?
CVE-2023-53991 was published on 2025-12-24 and last updated on 2026-06-17.

References