WARNING: refcount bug in dvb_device_get

Status: moderation: reported on 2026/07/16 20:30
Subsystems: media
Labels: prio:high
[Documentation on labels]
Reported-by: syzbot+df25983d45d7c6891ca9@syzkaller.appspotmail.com
First crash: 15d, last: 2d06h
✨ AI Jobs (4)
ID Workflow Result Correct Bug Created Started Finished Revision Error
c5b84e43 assessment-security DenialOfService: ✅ Exploitable: ✅ FilesystemTrigger: ❌ NetworkTrigger: ❌ PeripheralTrigger: ✅ RemoteTrigger: ❌ Unprivileged: ❌ UserNamespace: ❌ VMGuestTrigger: ❌ VMHostTrigger: ❌ WARNING: refcount bug in dvb_device_get 2026/07/23 00:43 2026/07/23 00:43 2026/07/23 01:13 44995053

			
		
4e5ddb8c assessment-security 💥 WARNING: refcount bug in dvb_device_get 2026/07/19 00:02 2026/07/19 00:02 2026/07/19 00:22 72524a66
failed to run ["make" "KERNELVERSION=syzkaller" "KERNELRELEASE=syzkaller" "LOCALVERSION=-syzkaller" "-j" "32" "ARCH=arm64" "CROSS_COMPILE=aarch64-linux-gnu-" "CC=ccache clang" "LD=ld.lld" "O=/app/work...
truncated to first 200 bytes; open job for full error
c7ab9d9c assessment-security 💥 WARNING: refcount bug in dvb_device_get 2026/07/16 00:56 2026/07/16 00:56 2026/07/16 01:08 10d97020
failed to run ["make" "KERNELVERSION=syzkaller" "KERNELRELEASE=syzkaller" "LOCALVERSION=-syzkaller" "-j" "32" "ARCH=arm64" "CROSS_COMPILE=aarch64-linux-gnu-" "CC=ccache clang" "LD=ld.lld" "O=/app/work...
truncated to first 200 bytes; open job for full error
4e147df3 assessment-security 💥 WARNING: refcount bug in dvb_device_get 2026/07/14 00:21 2026/07/14 00:21 2026/07/14 00:43 2130f682
failed to run ["make" "KERNELVERSION=syzkaller" "KERNELRELEASE=syzkaller" "LOCALVERSION=-syzkaller" "-j" "32" "ARCH=arm64" "CROSS_COMPILE=aarch64-linux-gnu-" "CC=ccache clang" "LD=ld.lld" "O=/app/work...
truncated to first 200 bytes; open job for full error

Sample crash report:
------------[ cut here ]------------
refcount_t: saturated; leaking memory.
WARNING: lib/refcount.c:22 at refcount_warn_saturate+0x1b4/0x1f8 lib/refcount.c:22, CPU#1: syz.2.434/6289
Modules linked in:
CPU: 1 UID: 0 PID: 6289 Comm: syz.2.434 Tainted: G             L      syzkaller #0 PREEMPT 
Tainted: [L]=SOFTLOCKUP
Hardware name: Google Google Compute Engine/Google Compute Engine, BIOS Google 07/02/2026
pstate: 63400005 (nZCv daif +PAN -UAO +TCO +DIT -SSBS BTYPE=--)
pc : refcount_warn_saturate+0x1b4/0x1f8 lib/refcount.c:22
lr : refcount_warn_saturate+0x1b4/0x1f8 lib/refcount.c:22
sp : ffff8000a8b17640
x29: ffff8000a8b17640 x28: dfff800000000000 x27: 1fffe0001a9f9201
x26: dfff800000000000 x25: ffff700015162edc x24: dfff800000000000
x23: ffff80008744d368 x22: ffff0000c45be810 x21: 000000007ffffffe
x20: ffff0000cbe1e210 x19: ffff80008a158000 x18: 1fffe00035bc9e28
x17: 0000000000000003 x16: ffff800088b07000 x15: ffff800088bbd060
x14: ffff0001ade4f14c x13: 0000000000000001 x12: 0000000000000000
x11: 0000000000000000 x10: 0000000000000003 x9 : 1a5e2493485ed000
x8 : 1a5e2493485ed000 x7 : 0000000000000000 x6 : 0000000000000000
x5 : 0000000000000001 x4 : 0000000000000008 x3 : ffff8000803b8a40
x2 : 0000000000000001 x1 : ffff0000cb571d40 x0 : 0000000000000001
Call trace:
 refcount_warn_saturate+0x1b4/0x1f8 lib/refcount.c:22 (P)
 __refcount_add include/linux/refcount.h:-1 [inline]
 __refcount_inc include/linux/refcount.h:366 [inline]
 refcount_inc include/linux/refcount.h:383 [inline]
 kref_get include/linux/kref.h:45 [inline]
 dvb_device_get+0x9c/0xc0 drivers/media/dvb-core/dvbdev.c:621
 dvb_device_open+0x100/0x254 drivers/media/dvb-core/dvbdev.c:106
 chrdev_open+0x398/0x3e8 fs/char_dev.c:411
 do_dentry_open+0x5c4/0xfc0 fs/open.c:947
 vfs_open+0x44/0x2dc fs/open.c:1052
 do_open fs/namei.c:4700 [inline]
 path_openat+0x21fc/0x2a60 fs/namei.c:4863
 do_file_open+0x1c8/0x2e8 fs/namei.c:4892
 do_sys_openat2+0x114/0x1e8 fs/open.c:1368
 do_sys_open+0xb0/0xe0 fs/open.c:1374
 __do_sys_openat fs/open.c:1390 [inline]
 __se_sys_openat fs/open.c:1385 [inline]
 __arm64_sys_openat+0xa0/0xbc fs/open.c:1385
 __invoke_syscall arch/arm64/kernel/syscall.c:35 [inline]
 invoke_syscall+0x98/0x244 arch/arm64/kernel/syscall.c:49
 el0_svc_common+0xec/0x23c arch/arm64/kernel/syscall.c:121
 do_el0_svc+0x4c/0x5c arch/arm64/kernel/syscall.c:140
 el0_svc+0x64/0x260 arch/arm64/kernel/entry-common.c:736
 el0t_64_sync_handler+0x48/0x148 arch/arm64/kernel/entry-common.c:755
 el0t_64_sync+0x198/0x19c arch/arm64/kernel/entry.S:594
irq event stamp: 1056
hardirqs last  enabled at (1055): [<ffff8000803b89f0>] raw_spin_rq_unlock_irq kernel/sched/sched.h:1673 [inline]
hardirqs last  enabled at (1055): [<ffff8000803b89f0>] finish_lock_switch kernel/sched/core.c:5241 [inline]
hardirqs last  enabled at (1055): [<ffff8000803b89f0>] finish_task_switch+0x234/0x858 kernel/sched/core.c:5359
hardirqs last disabled at (1056): [<ffff8000868dfe78>] el1_brk64+0x20/0x54 arch/arm64/kernel/entry-common.c:425
softirqs last  enabled at (1024): [<ffff800080139980>] local_bh_enable include/linux/bottom_half.h:33 [inline]
softirqs last  enabled at (1024): [<ffff800080139980>] put_cpu_fpsimd_context arch/arm64/kernel/fpsimd.c:251 [inline]
softirqs last  enabled at (1024): [<ffff800080139980>] do_sve_acc+0x32c/0x4b8 arch/arm64/kernel/fpsimd.c:1349
softirqs last disabled at (1022): [<ffff800080139760>] local_bh_disable include/linux/bottom_half.h:20 [inline]
softirqs last disabled at (1022): [<ffff800080139760>] get_cpu_fpsimd_context arch/arm64/kernel/fpsimd.c:234 [inline]
softirqs last disabled at (1022): [<ffff800080139760>] do_sve_acc+0x10c/0x4b8 arch/arm64/kernel/fpsimd.c:1325
---[ end trace 0000000000000000 ]---
UDC core: USB Raw Gadget: couldn't find an available UDC or it's busy
misc raw-gadget: fail, usb_gadget_register_driver returned -16

Crashes (2):
Time Kernel Commit Syzkaller Config Log Report Syz repro C repro VM info Assets (help?) Manager Title
2026/07/26 01:19 git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/arm64/linux.git for-kernelci b66b0005b6ce 492bab15 .config console log report info [disk image] [vmlinux] [kernel image] ci-upstream-gce-arm64 WARNING: refcount bug in dvb_device_get
2026/07/12 20:22 git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/arm64/linux.git for-kernelci a52d6c7160f7 d78ea535 .config console log report info [disk image] [vmlinux] [kernel image] ci-upstream-gce-arm64 WARNING: refcount bug in dvb_device_get
* Struck through repros no longer work on HEAD.