An uninitialized mutex in the Apple SMC (SMC) driver caused sporadic NULL pointer dereferences during probe operations, leading to kernel crashes and forced system reboots. The flaw represents a denial‑of‑service weakness, primarily due to improper initialization and subsequent null‑pointer dereference. Users of affected Linux kernels are at risk of abrupt service interruption whenever the SMC subsystem is interacted with during boot or runtime.

All Linux kernel builds that include the vulnerable Apple SMC driver prior to the fix. No specific version numbers are listed, so any kernel containing the uninitialized mutex code is impacted.

The crash is deterministic only when Apple SMC operations are invoked; an attacker with kernel‑level or privileged access could trigger the vulnerability by interacting with SMC sub‑devices, making exploitation feasible in environments where such access is obtainable. EPSS is not available and the issue is not listed in CISA KEV, but the absence of a CVSS score does not diminish the potential for a system‑wide denial‑of‑service. The attack vector is inferred to be local privileged, given the kernel context of the fault.