In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

firmware: arm_ffa: Fix FFA device names for logical partitions

Each physical partition can provide multiple services each with UUID.
Each such service can be presented as logical partition with a unique
combination of VM ID and UUID. The number of distinct UUID in a system
will be less than or equal to the number of logical partitions.

However, currently it fails to register more than one logical partition
or service within a physical partition as the device name contains only
VM ID while both VM ID and UUID are maintained in the partition information.
The kernel complains with the below message:

| sysfs: cannot create duplicate filename '/devices/arm-ffa-8001'
| CPU: 1 PID: 1 Comm: swapper/0 Not tainted 6.3.0-rc7 #8
| Hardware name: FVP Base RevC (DT)
| Call trace:
| dump_backtrace+0xf8/0x118
| show_stack+0x18/0x24
| dump_stack_lvl+0x50/0x68
| dump_stack+0x18/0x24
| sysfs_create_dir_ns+0xe0/0x13c
| kobject_add_internal+0x220/0x3d4
| kobject_add+0x94/0x100
| device_add+0x144/0x5d8
| device_register+0x20/0x30
| ffa_device_register+0x88/0xd8
| ffa_setup_partitions+0x108/0x1b8
| ffa_init+0x2ec/0x3a4
| do_one_initcall+0xcc/0x240
| do_initcall_level+0x8c/0xac
| do_initcalls+0x54/0x94
| do_basic_setup+0x1c/0x28
| kernel_init_freeable+0x100/0x16c
| kernel_init+0x20/0x1a0
| ret_from_fork+0x10/0x20
| kobject_add_internal failed for arm-ffa-8001 with -EEXIST, don't try to
| register things with the same name in the same directory.
| arm_ffa arm-ffa: unable to register device arm-ffa-8001 err=-17
| ARM FF-A: ffa_setup_partitions: failed to register partition ID 0x8001

By virtue of being random enough to avoid collisions when generated in a
distributed system, there is no way to compress UUID keys to the number
of bits required to identify each. We can eliminate '-' in the name but
it is not worth eliminating 4 bytes and add unnecessary logic for doing
that. Also v1.0 doesn't provide the UUID of the partitions which makes
it hard to use the same for the device name.

So to keep it simple, let us alloc an ID using ida_alloc() and append the
same to "arm-ffa" to make up a unique device name. Also stash the id value
in ffa_dev to help freeing the ID later when the device is destroyed.
Advisories
Source ID Title
EUVD EUVD EUVD-2023-59828 In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: firmware: arm_ffa: Fix FFA device names for logical partitions Each physical partition can provide multiple services each with UUID. Each such service can be presented as logical partition with a unique combination of VM ID and UUID. The number of distinct UUID in a system will be less than or equal to the number of logical partitions. However, currently it fails to register more than one logical partition or service within a physical partition as the device name contains only VM ID while both VM ID and UUID are maintained in the partition information. The kernel complains with the below message: | sysfs: cannot create duplicate filename '/devices/arm-ffa-8001' | CPU: 1 PID: 1 Comm: swapper/0 Not tainted 6.3.0-rc7 #8 | Hardware name: FVP Base RevC (DT) | Call trace: | dump_backtrace+0xf8/0x118 | show_stack+0x18/0x24 | dump_stack_lvl+0x50/0x68 | dump_stack+0x18/0x24 | sysfs_create_dir_ns+0xe0/0x13c | kobject_add_internal+0x220/0x3d4 | kobject_add+0x94/0x100 | device_add+0x144/0x5d8 | device_register+0x20/0x30 | ffa_device_register+0x88/0xd8 | ffa_setup_partitions+0x108/0x1b8 | ffa_init+0x2ec/0x3a4 | do_one_initcall+0xcc/0x240 | do_initcall_level+0x8c/0xac | do_initcalls+0x54/0x94 | do_basic_setup+0x1c/0x28 | kernel_init_freeable+0x100/0x16c | kernel_init+0x20/0x1a0 | ret_from_fork+0x10/0x20 | kobject_add_internal failed for arm-ffa-8001 with -EEXIST, don't try to | register things with the same name in the same directory. | arm_ffa arm-ffa: unable to register device arm-ffa-8001 err=-17 | ARM FF-A: ffa_setup_partitions: failed to register partition ID 0x8001 By virtue of being random enough to avoid collisions when generated in a distributed system, there is no way to compress UUID keys to the number of bits required to identify each. We can eliminate '-' in the name but it is not worth eliminating 4 bytes and add unnecessary logic for doing that. Also v1.0 doesn't provide the UUID of the partitions which makes it hard to use the same for the device name. So to keep it simple, let us alloc an ID using ida_alloc() and append the same to "arm-ffa" to make up a unique device name. Also stash the id value in ffa_dev to help freeing the ID later when the device is destroyed.
Fixes

Solution

No solution given by the vendor.


Workaround

No workaround given by the vendor.

History

Wed, 03 Dec 2025 17:15:00 +0000

Type Values Removed Values Added
Weaknesses NVD-CWE-noinfo
CPEs cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.4:rc1:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.4:rc2:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.4:rc3:*:*:*:*:*:*
Metrics cvssV3_1

{'score': 5.5, 'vector': 'CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H'}

cvssV3_1

{'score': 5.5, 'vector': 'CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N'}


Wed, 17 Sep 2025 11:00:00 +0000

Type Values Removed Values Added
First Time appeared Linux
Linux linux Kernel
Vendors & Products Linux
Linux linux Kernel

Tue, 16 Sep 2025 00:15:00 +0000

Type Values Removed Values Added
References
Metrics threat_severity

None

cvssV3_1

{'score': 5.5, 'vector': 'CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H'}

threat_severity

Low


Mon, 15 Sep 2025 15:00:00 +0000

Type Values Removed Values Added
Description In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: firmware: arm_ffa: Fix FFA device names for logical partitions Each physical partition can provide multiple services each with UUID. Each such service can be presented as logical partition with a unique combination of VM ID and UUID. The number of distinct UUID in a system will be less than or equal to the number of logical partitions. However, currently it fails to register more than one logical partition or service within a physical partition as the device name contains only VM ID while both VM ID and UUID are maintained in the partition information. The kernel complains with the below message: | sysfs: cannot create duplicate filename '/devices/arm-ffa-8001' | CPU: 1 PID: 1 Comm: swapper/0 Not tainted 6.3.0-rc7 #8 | Hardware name: FVP Base RevC (DT) | Call trace: | dump_backtrace+0xf8/0x118 | show_stack+0x18/0x24 | dump_stack_lvl+0x50/0x68 | dump_stack+0x18/0x24 | sysfs_create_dir_ns+0xe0/0x13c | kobject_add_internal+0x220/0x3d4 | kobject_add+0x94/0x100 | device_add+0x144/0x5d8 | device_register+0x20/0x30 | ffa_device_register+0x88/0xd8 | ffa_setup_partitions+0x108/0x1b8 | ffa_init+0x2ec/0x3a4 | do_one_initcall+0xcc/0x240 | do_initcall_level+0x8c/0xac | do_initcalls+0x54/0x94 | do_basic_setup+0x1c/0x28 | kernel_init_freeable+0x100/0x16c | kernel_init+0x20/0x1a0 | ret_from_fork+0x10/0x20 | kobject_add_internal failed for arm-ffa-8001 with -EEXIST, don't try to | register things with the same name in the same directory. | arm_ffa arm-ffa: unable to register device arm-ffa-8001 err=-17 | ARM FF-A: ffa_setup_partitions: failed to register partition ID 0x8001 By virtue of being random enough to avoid collisions when generated in a distributed system, there is no way to compress UUID keys to the number of bits required to identify each. We can eliminate '-' in the name but it is not worth eliminating 4 bytes and add unnecessary logic for doing that. Also v1.0 doesn't provide the UUID of the partitions which makes it hard to use the same for the device name. So to keep it simple, let us alloc an ID using ida_alloc() and append the same to "arm-ffa" to make up a unique device name. Also stash the id value in ffa_dev to help freeing the ID later when the device is destroyed.
Title firmware: arm_ffa: Fix FFA device names for logical partitions
References

cve-icon MITRE

Status: PUBLISHED

Assigner: Linux

Published:

Updated: 2025-09-15T14:46:28.024Z

Reserved: 2025-09-15T14:19:21.849Z

Link: CVE-2023-53256

cve-icon Vulnrichment

No data.

cve-icon NVD

Status : Analyzed

Published: 2025-09-15T15:15:52.980

Modified: 2025-12-03T17:04:38.433

Link: CVE-2023-53256

cve-icon Redhat

Severity : Low

Publid Date: 2025-09-15T00:00:00Z

Links: CVE-2023-53256 - Bugzilla

cve-icon OpenCVE Enrichment

Updated: 2025-09-17T10:06:53Z