At first, I didn’t plan to write an article about the problems with bug bounty programs. This was supposed to be a standard technical blogpost describing an interesting bug in the Linux Kernel i915 driver allowing for a linear Out-Of-Bound read and write access (CVE-2023-28410). Moreover, I’m not even into bug bounty programs, mostly because I don’t need to, since I consider myself lucky enough to have a satisfying, stable and well-paid job. That being said, in my spare time, apart from developing and maintaining the Linux Kernel Runtime Guard (LKRG) project, I still like doing vulnerability research and exploit development not only for my employer, and from time to time it’s good to update your resume with new CVE numbers. Before I started to have a stable income, bug bounties didn’t exist and most of the quality vulnerability research outcome was paying the bills via brokers (let’s leave aside the moral questions arising from this). However, nowadays we have bug bounty programs…

Read more