MediumCVE-2026-98815

Linux Kernel: Use-After-Free (CVE-2026-98815)

Published 18.10.2026Last modified 19.10.2026Sources: Msrc Update Guide, CVE.org, BSI

What is affected, what to do

Update Linux Kernel to version 7.2.10, Linux Kernel to version 7.3.

Affected: Linux Kernel lt 5.13..7.2.10
Fixed in: Linux Kernel 7.2.10
Linux Kernel 7.3

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Metrics

6.5

Priority

XIEM Effective CVSS: highest available CVSS rating from NVD and vendor data.

Source: Vendor (CNA), CVSS v3

6.5

CVSS v3

Severity Medium on the scale from 0 to 10.

Source: Msrc Update Guide, CVE.org, BSI

0.2 %

EPSS score

Low — model estimates < 1% exploitation likelihood.

Source: FIRST EPSS, percentile 9.6

Show all metrics

Severity: Medium
Priority (0–325) The priority score is a consolidated metric that condenses several individual signals into a single, action-guiding ranking: technical severity (CVSS), exploitation likelihood (EPSS), known-exploited status (KEV) and the context of the affected asset. The aim is to answer the only truly important question in vulnerability management: what first? Read in glossary: 63.23 Methodology
Exploit maturity An exploit is code or a technique that specifically uses a concrete vulnerability to force unintended behaviour — such as executing code or escalating privileges. It is the tool that turns a theoretical flaw into a practical attack. Read in glossary: no public PoC known
XIEM Effective CVSS XIEM® is the tiered managed-security operating model from NEOSEC and a registered trademark of NEOSEC GmbH. It extends classic SIEM — the central collection, normalisation and correlation of security-relevant events — with endpoint forensics, network visibility and deception technology, and consolidates them into three building tiers: Sentry, Orchestrate and Command. Read in glossary: 6.5 Methodology
CVSS v3 CVSS is the globally established, open standard for assessing the technical severity of a vulnerability on a scale from 0 to 10. It describes how easily a flaw can be exploited and what damage it can cause — but not how likely its actual exploitation is. CVSS and the complementary EPSS deliberately answer different questions. Read in glossary: 6.5
EPSS score The EPSS score is the absolute model output for an individual vulnerability: the estimated probability of real-world exploitation within the next 30 days, expressed as a value between 0 and 1 (i.e. 0 % to 100 %). A score of 0.42 means „the model estimates a 42 % chance of real-world exploitation within 30 days“. Read in glossary: 0.2 %; Low — model estimates < 1% exploitation likelihood.
EPSS percentile The EPSS percentile is the relative position of a vulnerability within all EPSS-scored CVEs, expressed as a value between 0 and 1. A percentile of 0.90 means „this CVE has a higher EPSS score than 90 % of all other scored CVEs“. Unlike the EPSS score, it is not a probability — but a positioning within a ranking. Read in glossary: 9.6; Low — this CVE sits in the lower 10% of all CVEs scored today.
KEV status The KEV catalogue is a list maintained by the US authority CISA of vulnerabilities for which active exploitation in the wild has been confirmed. It answers not the question „how severe?“ but „is it already being attacked?“ — thereby sharply prioritising patching. Read in glossary: —
Published: 18.10.2026

Detection rules

No NEOSEC detection rule is available for this vulnerability yet.

Classification under NIS2 and CRA

Rule-based classification from exploitation status and severity. It does not replace a case-by-case assessment.

NIS2 NIS2 is EU Directive (EU) 2022/2555 to raise the level of cybersecurity across the Union. It substantially broadens obligations compared with the first NIS directive: more sectors, mandatory risk management, staged reporting duties and personal accountability of senior management. Read in glossary: Handle the vulnerability in regular vulnerability handling under Art. 21(2)(e) NIS2.
CRA The CRA is EU Regulation (EU) 2024/2847 setting horizontal cybersecurity requirements for „products with digital elements“ — from industrial controllers and software to connected consumer devices. For the first time manufacturers must ensure security across the entire product lifecycle, handle vulnerabilities and provide security updates. Read in glossary: From 11.12.2027, Annex I Part II CRA requires manufacturers of affected products with digital elements to handle vulnerabilities without delay and provide security updates.
ISO/IEC 27001 ISO/IEC 27001 is the internationally leading standard for an information security management system (ISMS). It describes a risk-based, process-oriented framework to systematically plan, implement, review and improve information security. Read in glossary: Control A.8.8, management of technical vulnerabilities: assess relevance to your systems, plan remediation and keep evidence.

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

nvme: fix cdev lifetime

Sashiko bot reported a potential problem for the cdev lifetime in [0]

the code there is heavily based on the NVMe code.

Currently the NS head .open and .release file_operations methods take and put a reference to the nvme_ns_head to ensure that this structure does not disappear while we open fds for that cdev.

In multipath mode, when we teardown the NS head, we call nvme_cdev_del() -> cdev_device_del() -> cdev_del(). However after cdev_del() returns, cdevs already open will remain and their fops will still be callable. As such, we can still reference the cdev after the nvme_ns_head reference count drops to 0 (and is freed).

This can be shown with an application which delays between opening the cdev and issuing the ioctl while the NS head is being torn down:

./ioctl_file /dev/ng1n1 &

waiting 10 seconds ....

./ini_nvme_teardown.sh

[ 21.221718] nvme nvme1: Removing ctrl: NQN "nvme-test-target" [ 21.274609] nvme nvme2: Removing ctrl: NQN "nvme-test-target"

now going to issue ioctl ....

[ 26.549285] ================================================================== [ 26.550841] BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in cdev_put.part.0+0x3d/0x40 [ 26.552352] Read of size 8 at addr ffff88811e7fa170 by task ioctl_file/237 [ 26.553805] [ 26.554227] CPU: 3 UID: 0 PID: 237 Comm: ioctl_file Not tainted 7.2.0-rc1-00004-g6852a10e32d4 #921 PREEMPT(lazy) [ 26.554236] Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (Q35 + ICH9, 2009), BIOS 1.16.3-debian-1.16.3-2 04/01/2014 [ 26.554241] Call Trace: [ 26.554245] [ 26.554248] dump_stack_lvl+0x68/0xa0 [ 26.554266] print_report+0x10d/0x5d0 [ 26.554276] ? __virt_addr_valid+0x21d/0x3f0 [ 26.554287] ? cdev_put.part.0+0x3d/0x40 [ 26.554292] kasan_report+0x96/0xd0 [ 26.554300] ? cdev_put.part.0+0x3d/0x40 [ 26.554307] cdev_put.part.0+0x3d/0x40 [ 26.554313] __fput+0x7bc/0xa70 [ 26.554322] fput_close_sync+0xd8/0x190 [ 26.554328] ? __pfx_fput_close_sync+0x10/0x10 [ 26.554337] __x64_sys_close+0x79/0xd0 [ 26.554344] do_syscall_64+0x117/0x6b0 [ 26.554351] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f [ 26.554358] RIP: 0033:0x7f938c067727 [ 26.554364] Code: 48 89 fa 4c 89 df e8 28 ad 00 00 8b 93 08 03 00 00 59 5e 48 83 f8 fc 74 1a 5b c3 0f 1f 84 00 00 00 00 00 48 8b 44 24 10 0f 05 <5bf [ 26.554369] RSP: 002b:00007fff49f05980 EFLAGS: 00000202 ORIG_RAX: 0000000000000003 [ 26.554376] RAX: ffffffffffffffda RBX: 00007f938bfd7780 RCX: 00007f938c067727 [ 26.554380] RDX: 0000000000000000 RSI: 0000000000000000 RDI: 0000000000000003 [ 26.554383] RBP: 00007fff49f05a10 R08: 0000000000000000 R09: 0000000000000000 [ 26.554386] R10: 0000000000000000 R11: 0000000000000202 R12: 0000000000000000 [ 26.554389] R13: 00007fff49f05b40 R14: 00007f938c207000 R15: 000055c148471d78 [ 26.554397] [ 26.554399] [ 26.575612] Allocated by task 100: [ 26.575871] kasan_save_stack+0x24/0x50 [ 26.576157] kasan_save_track+0x14/0x30 [ 26.576418] __kasan_kmalloc+0x7f/0x90 [ 26.576668] __kmalloc_noprof+0x281/0x6c0 [ 26.576938] nvme_alloc_ns+0x7f7/0x3170 [ 26.577206] nvme_scan_ns+0x508/0x880 [ 26.577449] async_run_entry_fn+0x8c/0x350 [ 26.577723] process_scheduled_works+0xb6f/0x1a00 [ 26.578034] worker_thread+0x4ad/0xb40 [ 26.578283] kthread+0x34f/0x450 [ 26.578501] ret_from_fork+0x563/0x800 [ 26.578752] ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30 [ 26.579012] [ 26.579124] Freed by task 237: [ 26.579335] kasan_save_stack+0x24/0x50 [ 26.579596] kasan_save_track+0x14/0x30 [ 26.579855] kasan_save_free_info+0x3a/0x60 [ 26.580131] __kasan_slab_free+0x43/0x70 [ 26.580388] kfree+0x321/0x500 [ 26.580591] nvme_ns_head_chr_release+0x39/0x50 [ 26.580883] __fput+0x352/0xa70 [ 26.581095] fput_close_sync+0xd8/0x190 [ 26.581350] __x64_sys_close+0x79/0xd0 [ 26.581595] do_syscall_64+0x117/0x6b0 [ 26.581842] entry_SYSCAL ---truncated---

Source: Microsoft Security Update Guide, cvelistv5, NVD (NIST), BSI WID Portal, BSI CSAF

Affected products

The following versions are affected. Older releases of the same product line are also vulnerable unless stated otherwise.

Affected products
		Affected versions	Fixed in
Linux	Linux	`5.13 – < 7.2.10` `—`	`7.2.10` `7.3`

Vendors and products

Linux Linux

References & sources

git.kernel.orgstable/c/98b09ad7934482e64db4b4477d91e3bbf43adf4c
git.kernel.orgstable/c/9952f3882ecba709092379b71e02b09762b26f96

Changes to this CVE

Who changed this CVE and when: NVD (analysis, affected products, CVSS), the CVE publisher (CNA) and additional providers such as CISA (ADP).

19.10.2026Record modifiedLinux

1 individual change: Affected versions (publisher)

Show the original change

Individual changes of this event as published by NVD
Type	Action	Before	After
Affected versions (publisher)	added	—	Affected value modified. <a href="https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/blob/main/cves/2026/98xxx/CVE-2026-98815.json">CVE-2026-98815</a>

Source identifier: 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67

18.10.2026ReceivedLinux

Description added or changed

New references:

Show 4 original changes

Individual changes of this event as published by NVD
Type	Action	Before	After
Description	added	—	In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: nvme: fix cdev lifetime Sashiko bot reported a potential problem for the cdev lifetime in [0] - the code there is heavily based on the NVMe code. Currently the NS head .open and .release file_operations methods take and put a reference to the nvme_ns_head to ensure that this structure does not disappear while we open fds for that cdev. In multipath mode, when we teardown the NS head, we call nvme_cdev_del() -> cdev_device_del() -> cdev_del(). However after cdev_del() returns, cdevs already open will remain and their fops will still be callable. As such, we can still reference the cdev after the nvme_ns_head reference count drops to 0 (and is freed). This can be shown with an application which delays between opening the cdev and issuing the ioctl while the NS head is being torn down: # ./ioctl_file /dev/ng1n1 & # waiting 10 seconds .... # ./ini_nvme_teardown.sh [ 21.221718] nvme nvme1: Removing ctrl: NQN "nvme-test-target" [ 21.274609] nvme nvme2: Removing ctrl: NQN "nvme-test-target" # now going to issue ioctl .... [ 26.549285] ================================================================== [ 26.550841] BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in cdev_put.part.0+0x3d/0x40 [ 26.552352] Read of size 8 at addr ffff88811e7fa170 by task ioctl_file/237 [ 26.553805] [ 26.554227] CPU: 3 UID: 0 PID: 237 Comm: ioctl_file Not tainted 7.2.0-rc1-00004-g6852a10e32d4 #921 PREEMPT(lazy) [ 26.554236] Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (Q35 + ICH9, 2009), BIOS 1.16.3-debian-1.16.3-2 04/01/2014 [ 26.554241] Call Trace: [ 26.554245] <TASK> [ 26.554248] dump_stack_lvl+0x68/0xa0 [ 26.554266] print_report+0x10d/0x5d0 [ 26.554276] ? __virt_addr_valid+0x21d/0x3f0 [ 26.554287] ? cdev_put.part.0+0x3d/0x40 [ 26.554292] kasan_report+0x96/0xd0 [ 26.554300] ? cdev_put.part.0+0x3d/0x40 [ 26.554307] cdev_put.part.0+0x3d/0x40 [ 26.554313] __fput+0x7bc/0xa70 [ 26.554322] fput_close_sync+0xd8/0x190 [ 26.554328] ? __pfx_fput_close_sync+0x10/0x10 [ 26.554337] __x64_sys_close+0x79/0xd0 [ 26.554344] do_syscall_64+0x117/0x6b0 [ 26.554351] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f [ 26.554358] RIP: 0033:0x7f938c067727 [ 26.554364] Code: 48 89 fa 4c 89 df e8 28 ad 00 00 8b 93 08 03 00 00 59 5e 48 83 f8 fc 74 1a 5b c3 0f 1f 84 00 00 00 00 00 48 8b 44 24 10 0f 05 <5bf [ 26.554369] RSP: 002b:00007fff49f05980 EFLAGS: 00000202 ORIG_RAX: 0000000000000003 [ 26.554376] RAX: ffffffffffffffda RBX: 00007f938bfd7780 RCX: 00007f938c067727 [ 26.554380] RDX: 0000000000000000 RSI: 0000000000000000 RDI: 0000000000000003 [ 26.554383] RBP: 00007fff49f05a10 R08: 0000000000000000 R09: 0000000000000000 [ 26.554386] R10: 0000000000000000 R11: 0000000000000202 R12: 0000000000000000 [ 26.554389] R13: 00007fff49f05b40 R14: 00007f938c207000 R15: 000055c148471d78 [ 26.554397] </TASK> [ 26.554399] [ 26.575612] Allocated by task 100: [ 26.575871] kasan_save_stack+0x24/0x50 [ 26.576157] kasan_save_track+0x14/0x30 [ 26.576418] __kasan_kmalloc+0x7f/0x90 [ 26.576668] __kmalloc_noprof+0x281/0x6c0 [ 26.576938] nvme_alloc_ns+0x7f7/0x3170 [ 26.577206] nvme_scan_ns+0x508/0x880 [ 26.577449] async_run_entry_fn+0x8c/0x350 [ 26.577723] process_scheduled_works+0xb6f/0x1a00 [ 26.578034] worker_thread+0x4ad/0xb40 [ 26.578283] kthread+0x34f/0x450 [ 26.578501] ret_from_fork+0x563/0x800 [ 26.578752] ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30 [ 26.579012] [ 26.579124] Freed by task 237: [ 26.579335] kasan_save_stack+0x24/0x50 [ 26.579596] kasan_save_track+0x14/0x30 [ 26.579855] kasan_save_free_info+0x3a/0x60 [ 26.580131] __kasan_slab_free+0x43/0x70 [ 26.580388] kfree+0x321/0x500 [ 26.580591] nvme_ns_head_chr_release+0x39/0x50 [ 26.580883] __fput+0x352/0xa70 [ 26.581095] fput_close_sync+0xd8/0x190 [ 26.581350] __x64_sys_close+0x79/0xd0 [ 26.581595] do_syscall_64+0x117/0x6b0 [ 26.581842] entry_SYSCAL ---truncated---
Affected versions (publisher)	added	—	New affected value received. <a href="https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/blob/main/cves/2026/98xxx/CVE-2026-98815.json">CVE-2026-98815</a>
Reference	added	—	https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/98b09ad7934482e64db4b4477d91e3bbf43adf4c
Reference	added	—	https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/9952f3882ecba709092379b71e02b09762b26f96

Source identifier: 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67

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<a href="https://intel.neosec.eu/en/cve/CVE-2026-98815"><img src="https://intel.neosec.eu/badge/cve/CVE-2026-98815.svg?lang=en" alt="CVE-2026-98815 – NEOSEC Intel" height="20"></a>