tcp: restore RCU grace period in tcp_ao_destroy_sock
Key facts
- Attack vector
- Network
- Privileges required
- None
- User interaction
- None
- Attack complexity
- Low
- Impact type
- —
- Confidentiality · integrity · availability
- High · High · High
- Fix status
- Fixed
Attack profile from CVSS 3.1 · CNA. Fix status from CNA.
Summary
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: tcp: restore RCU grace period in tcp_ao_destroy_sock Commit 51e547e8c89c ("tcp: Free TCP-AO/TCP-MD5 info/keys without RCU") removed the call_rcu() callback from tcp_ao_destroy_sock(), arguing that "the destruction of info/keys is delayed until the socket destructor" and therefore "no one can discover it anymore". That argument does not hold for the call site in tcp_connect() (net/ipv4/tcp_output.c:4327-4332). At that point the socket is in TCP_SYN_SENT, has already been inserted into the inet ehash by inet_hash_connect() in tcp_v4_connect(), and is therefore very much discoverable: any softirq running tcp_v4_rcv() on another CPU can take the socket out of the ehash, walk into tcp_inbound_hash(), and load tp->ao_info via implicit RCU before bh_lock_sock_nested() is taken on the destroying CPU. The reader path then enters __tcp_ao_do_lookup() (net/ipv4/tcp_ao.c:208) which re-loads tp->ao_info via rcu_dereference_check(); the re-load can still observe the (about-to-be-freed) pointer because there is no synchronize_rcu() between rcu_assign_pointer(tp->ao_info, NULL) and tcp_ao_info_free() in tcp_ao_destroy_sock(). The captured pointer is then walked at line 223: hlist_for_each_entry_rcu(key, &ao->head, node, ...) The writer's synchronous kfree() is free to complete between the line 218 re-fetch and the line 223 hlist iteration. The slab is reused (or simply LIST_POISON1-stamped if not yet reused) and the iteration walks attacker-controlled or poison memory in softirq context. Reproducer (no debug shim, stock x86_64 v7.1-rc2 SMP+KASAN, QEMU+KVM): an unprivileged uid=1000 process inside CLONE_NEWUSER|CLONE_NEWNET installs TCP_MD5SIG + TCP_AO_ADD_KEY on a TCP socket, sprays forged TCP-AO segments toward its eventual 4-tuple via raw sockets, then calls connect(). The md5-wins reconciliation in tcp_connect() fires tcp_ao_destroy_sock(); the softirq backlog reader on the loopback NAPI path crashes on the freed ao->head.first walk: Oops: general protection fault, probably for non-canonical address 0xfbd59c000000002f KASAN: maybe wild-memory-access in range [0xdead000000000178-0xdead00000000017f] CPU: 0 UID: 1000 PID: 100 Comm: repro_userns RIP: 0010:__tcp_ao_do_lookup+0x107/0x1c0 Call Trace: <IRQ> __tcp_ao_do_lookup+0x107/0x1c0 tcp_ao_inbound_lookup.constprop.0+0x12a/0x200 tcp_inbound_ao_hash+0x5ea/0x1520 tcp_inbound_hash+0x7ce/0x1240 tcp_v4_rcv+0x1e7a/0x3e10 ... Restore the RCU grace period: re-add struct rcu_head to tcp_ao_info and replace the synchronous tcp_ao_info_free() with a call_rcu() callback. Readers that captured tp->ao_info before rcu_assign_pointer NULLed it now see the object remain valid until rcu_read_unlock(). With the patch applied the reproducer runs cleanly for 2000 iterations on the same kernel build.
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 6.18.39, 7.1.4, 7.2
Vendor assessments
Red Hat
Red Hat rating: Moderate. Red Hat's page for this CVE →
Not affected: 5 products
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9
Timeline
- 2026-10-02 Threatist record created from CVE-2026-64459
- 2026-10-03 Alias added: GHSA-6hpw-qg6p-q7xc
- 2026-10-13 Affected versions changed · Red Hat
- 2026-10-16 EPSS moved to the 50th–90th percentile
- 2026-10-20 Affected versions changed · Red Hat
References
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Sources
- CVE-2026-64459 · CVE Program
- CVE-2026-64459 · NVD
- FIRST EPSS
- GHSA-6hpw-qg6p-q7xc · GitHub Advisory Database · CC BY 4.0
- CVE-2026-64459 · Red Hat security data · CC BY 4.0
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