A bug in the Linux macb driver causes the transmit ring to be incorrectly reset to zero when transmit is disabled. This results in packets already queued in the tx ring being silently lost, leading to memory leaks of skb structures, and can cause the transmitter to become stuck on a packet that has already been sent but not yet processed. The improper manipulation of queue pointers also allows concurrent write access to the head and tail indices, creating a race condition that further degrades the reliability of network transmission.

The vulnerability affects all machines running the Linux kernel with the macb driver enabled, with a pronounced impact on AMD Zynq UltraScale devices that use a Network File System rootfilesystem. Any system that performs suspend/resume operations and relies on the macb Ethernet controller while the kernel version predates the patch will be affected. This includes embedded boards and appliances that implement the ZynqMP SoC and run an unpatched Linux distribution.

The CVSS score is 5.5, but the EPSS score is < 1%, indicating a very low exploitation probability. The CVE has not been listed in the CISA KEV catalog, implying no known active exploitation at the time of analysis. Reasoning about the attack vector, a local or privileged user could trigger the defect by initiating a suspend/resume cycle or by forcing a transmit disable/reset sequence, potentially leading to a service interruption. Since the flaw is tied to driver internals and requires control over hardware initialization, it is unlikely to be exploitable from unprivileged remote access, but could be leveraged by a disgruntled insider or through firmware updates.