[PATCH net 1/2] net: dsa: mt7530: fix NULL dereference on unbind of MT7531 and MT7621

From: Aleksei Sviridkin

Date: Mon Sep 14 2026 - 16:28:29 EST


The core and io supplies are only requested for ID_MT7530: both the
devm_regulator_get() in probe and the regulator_enable() in
mt7530_setup() are guarded by the switch id, but mt7530_remove()
disables them unconditionally. On an MT7621 or an MT7531 both pointers
are NULL, so rmmod or a sysfs unbind calls regulator_disable() on NULL.

Fixes: ddda1ac116c8 ("net: dsa: mt7530: support the 7530 switch on the Mediatek MT7621 SoC")
Signed-off-by: Aleksei Sviridkin <f@xxxxxx>
Assisted-by: LLM
---
Found by accident on a Netcraze NC-1012 (MT7981B + MT7531, 6.18.44) while
looking for a way to tear a DSA port down at runtime:

# echo mdio-bus:1f > /sys/bus/mdio_bus/drivers/mt7530-mdio/unbind
Unable to handle kernel access to user memory outside uaccess routines
at virtual address 0000000000000078
pc : regulator_disable+0x14/0x48
lr : mt7530_remove+0x1c/0x80
x0 : 0000000000000000
Call trace:
regulator_disable+0x14/0x48 (P)
mt7530_remove+0x1c/0x80
mdio_remove+0x20/0x40
device_release_driver_internal+0x1cc/0x220
unbind_store+0xac/0xb0
Kernel panic - not syncing: Oops: Fatal exception

The oops itself is a process-context oops that kills the writing task. It
became a panic and a reboot because OpenWrt's generic kernel config sets
CONFIG_PANIC_ON_OOPS=y and this target does not override it, not because of
anything local to this bench. With CONFIG_REGULATOR=n the stub
regulator_disable() returns 0 and nothing is dereferenced at all -
NET_DSA_MT7530 neither selects nor depends on REGULATOR - so the severity is
config-dependent, and the commit message states the mechanism rather than an
outcome.

x0 is the regulator pointer and regulator_disable() reads regulator->rdev
straight away, so the NULL comes from the field never being assigned rather
than from an error pointer: with CONFIG_REGULATOR=y devm_regulator_get()
hands back a valid pointer or an ERR_PTR, and on anything but ID_MT7530 it
is never called at all.

The same shape applies to MT7621, which mt7530_of_match also binds. The MMIO
driver is unaffected: it makes no regulator calls at all, though it does still
carry the include.

The id test is used rather than a NULL check because the driver already
says "these supplies belong to ID_MT7530" that way in the other two
places it matters: the devm_regulator_get() pair in mt7530_probe() and the
regulator_set_voltage()/regulator_enable() pair in mt7530_setup(). A NULL
check would be a third spelling of the same condition.

Tested on the board above. Without the patch the unbind panics as shown; both
pointers come out of kzalloc and are never assigned on an MT7531, so the fault
is structural rather than timing-dependent. With this patch plus the unrelated
teardown fix described below, the same unbind runs to completion: mdio-bus:1f
leaves /sys/bus/mdio_bus/drivers/mt7530-mdio/, lan1-lan4 disappear, the kernel
prints "DSA: tree 0 torn down", and uptime does not reset. The kernel under
test was identified by the sha256 of its ELF notes section, read from
/sys/kernel/notes on the running board and computed in advance from the image
that was flashed.

dmesg is not silent across that unbind. It gains one WARN - a single cut
here/WARNING/end trace block - from sysfs_remove_link() under
dsa_user_destroy() reaching an already-removed netdev directory: "kernfs: can
not remove 'phydev', no directory". That is a DSA teardown-ordering defect
rather than a regulator one, and in this run it fired on the first unbind
after boot. dmesg is where it shows: pstore gained no new record across the
run, but pstore records only oopses and panics and could not have caught a
WARN.

That run needed one unrelated fix on top, deliberately kept out of this patch:
mt7530_remove_common() frees the MDIO IRQs before dsa_unregister_switch()
hands them back, and the board dies in handle_nested_irq() a few hundred
milliseconds later. With this patch alone, the panic moves from
regulator_disable+0x14 to that second defect, and mt7530_remove is reached at
+0x24/0x90 rather than +0x1c/0x80 - which is the point: the NULL dereference
is gone and execution now gets past it. That second defect is being handled
separately.

Not tested: the ID_MT7530 branch, which must still disable both rails. There
is no MT7530 or MT7621 hardware here, so the disassembly stands in for it -
before the change mt7530_remove() falls from the priv NULL check straight into
ldr x0, [x19, #40] / bl regulator_disable; after it, ldr w0, [x19, #72]
(priv->id) / cbz w0 gates both calls, and ID_MT7530 is 0. Built with W=1, no
warnings; checkpatch --strict clean.

drivers/net/dsa/mt7530-mdio.c | 18 ++++++++++--------
1 file changed, 10 insertions(+), 8 deletions(-)

diff --git a/drivers/net/dsa/mt7530-mdio.c b/drivers/net/dsa/mt7530-mdio.c
index 784dd58a7158..de42f70afcfa 100644
--- a/drivers/net/dsa/mt7530-mdio.c
+++ b/drivers/net/dsa/mt7530-mdio.c
@@ -227,15 +227,17 @@ mt7530_remove(struct mdio_device *mdiodev)
if (!priv)
return;

- ret = regulator_disable(priv->core_pwr);
- if (ret < 0)
- dev_err(priv->dev,
- "Failed to disable core power: %d\n", ret);
+ if (priv->id == ID_MT7530) {
+ ret = regulator_disable(priv->core_pwr);
+ if (ret < 0)
+ dev_err(priv->dev,
+ "Failed to disable core power: %d\n", ret);

- ret = regulator_disable(priv->io_pwr);
- if (ret < 0)
- dev_err(priv->dev, "Failed to disable io pwr: %d\n",
- ret);
+ ret = regulator_disable(priv->io_pwr);
+ if (ret < 0)
+ dev_err(priv->dev, "Failed to disable io pwr: %d\n",
+ ret);
+ }

mt7530_remove_common(priv);

--
2.53.0