Vulnerability · Published Sep 15, 2025 · Assigned by Linux

CVE-2022-50277ext4: don't allow journal inode to have encrypt flag

Medium 5.5

In plain English

A medium-severity security flaw in Linux from Linux. There are no confirmed reports of exploitation so far. The chance it is exploited in the next 30 days is estimated at 0.1% (higher than 1% of all known vulnerabilities). Fixed versions are available - upgrade the affected package.

Severity (CVSS NVD)5.5Medium
Exploit odds (30 days)0.1%top 99.1% of all CVEs
Exploited in the wildNo reportsnot in CISA KEV
Attack toolingNoneno public tooling known

Official description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: ext4: don't allow journal inode to have encrypt flag Mounting a filesystem whose journal inode has the encrypt flag causes a NULL dereference in fscrypt_limit_io_blocks() when the 'inlinecrypt' mount option is used. The problem is that when jbd2_journal_init_inode() calls bmap(), it eventually finds its way into ext4_iomap_begin(), which calls fscrypt_limit_io_blocks(). fscrypt_limit_io_blocks() requires that if the inode is encrypted, then its encryption key must already be set up. That's not the case here, since the journal inode is never "opened" like a normal file would be. Hence the crash. A reproducer is: mkfs.ext4 -F /dev/vdb debugfs -w /dev/vdb -R "set_inode_field <8> flags 0x80808" mount /dev/vdb /mnt -o inlinecrypt To fix this, make ext4 consider journal inodes with the encrypt flag to be invalid. (Note, maybe other flags should be rejected on the journal inode too. For now, this is just the minimal fix for the above issue.) I've marked this as fixing the commit that introduced the call to fscrypt_limit_io_blocks(), since that's what made an actual crash start being possible. But this fix could be applied to any version of ext4 that supports the encrypt feature.

Affected packages & fixed versions

EcosystemPackageFixed inAdvisory
Debian:12linux6.1.4-1DEBIAN-CVE-2022-50277
Debian:13linux6.1.4-1DEBIAN-CVE-2022-50277
Debian:14linux6.1.4-1DEBIAN-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-allwinner-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-aws-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-aws-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-aws-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-azure-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-azure-6.11no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-azure-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-azure-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-azure-fde-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-azure-fde-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-gcp-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-gcp-6.11no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-gcp-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-gcp-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-hwe-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-hwe-6.11no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-hwe-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-hwe-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-intelno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-intel-iot-realtimeno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-lowlatency-hwe-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-lowlatency-hwe-6.11no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-lowlatency-hwe-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-lowlatency-hwe-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-nvidia-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-nvidia-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-oem-5.17no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-oem-6.0no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-oem-6.1no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-oem-6.11no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-oem-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-oem-6.8no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-oracle-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-raspi-realtimeno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-realtimeno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-realtimeno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-riscvno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-riscvno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-riscv-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-riscv-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-starfive-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-starfive-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-starfive-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2022-50277

Affected products (as reported)

VendorProductVersions
Linux Linux 38ea50daa7a447dbcd7031f37a39a1baa163b2ab – before 1f7a6626f611aa06d7907aa45b484708dd5ac8bc38ea50daa7a447dbcd7031f37a39a1baa163b2ab – before bcc5057e1781a3ee889225480d995c3b5cbde55538ea50daa7a447dbcd7031f37a39a1baa163b2ab – before 105c78e12468413e426625831faa7db4284e1fec
Linux Linux 5.18

References