mm, shmem: prevent infinite loop on truncate race
Key facts
- Attack vector
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- Privileges required
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- User interaction
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- Attack complexity
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- Impact type
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- Confidentiality · integrity · availability
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- Fix status
- Partial Red Hat: 2 without a fix
No CVSS vector from any source. Fix status from CNA and Red Hat.
Summary
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: mm, shmem: prevent infinite loop on truncate race When truncating a large swap entry, shmem_free_swap() returns 0 when the entry's index doesn't match the given index due to lookup alignment. The failure fallback path checks if the entry crosses the end border and aborts when it happens, so truncate won't erase an unexpected entry or range. But one scenario was ignored. When `index` points to the middle of a large swap entry, and the large swap entry doesn't go across the end border, find_get_entries() will return that large swap entry as the first item in the batch with `indices[0]` equal to `index`. The entry's base index will be smaller than `indices[0]`, so shmem_free_swap() will fail and return 0 due to the "base < index" check. The code will then call shmem_confirm_swap(), get the order, check if it crosses the END boundary (which it doesn't), and retry with the same index. The next iteration will find the same entry again at the same index with same indices, leading to an infinite loop. Fix this by retrying with a round-down index, and abort if the index is smaller than the truncate range.
Why it matters now
SSVC decision points
Not available: CISA has not published SSVC decision points for this record.
Affected products
Remediation
- Fix · CNA Linux (Linux) Fixed in 6.12.70, 6.18.10, 6.19
Vendor assessments
Red Hat
Red Hat rating: Moderate. Red Hat's page for this CVE →
| Product | Status | Plan or fix |
|---|---|---|
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 | Affected | No fix planned: Out of support scope |
Not affected: 3 products
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9
Timeline
- 2026-10-02 Threatist record created from CVE-2026-23177
- 2026-10-03 Alias added: GHSA-xwq7-47qj-qwwf
References
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Sources
- CVE-2026-23177 · CVE Program
- CVE-2026-23177 · NVD
- FIRST EPSS
- GHSA-xwq7-47qj-qwwf · GitHub Advisory Database · CC BY 4.0
- CVE-2026-23177 · Red Hat security data · CC BY 4.0
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