In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: serial: max310x: fix NULL pointer dereference in I2C instantiation When trying to instantiate a max14830 device from userspace: echo max14830 0x60 > /sys/bus/i2c/devices/i2c-2/new_device we get the following error: Unable to handle kernel NULL pointer dereference at virtual address... ... Call trace: max310x_i2c_probe+0x48/0x170 [max310x] i2c_device_probe+0x150/0x2a0 ... Add check for validity of devtype to prevent the error, and abort probe with a meaningful error message.