net/sched: cls_route: free emptied bucket on filter move
Key facts
- Attack vector
- —
- Privileges required
- —
- User interaction
- —
- Attack complexity
- —
- Impact type
- —
- Confidentiality · integrity · availability
- —
- Fix status
- Partial Red Hat: 4 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: net/sched: cls_route: free emptied bucket on filter move route4_change can move an existing filter to a different top-level bucket: route4_set_parms recomputes the handle from TCA_ROUTE4_TO/ FROM/IIF, and the handle-mismatch check is gated on the 'new' flag, so for an existing filter the new handle may differ from the old one and land in a different bucket. When this happens, the filter is unlinked from the old bucket, but the bucket itself is never freed once it goes empty. The stale empty bucket remains in head->table[], causing route4_delete to report *last=false even after the last live filter is gone. That pins the empty tcf_proto and causes a leak. Fix this by refcounting the filters linked to a bucket and freeing the bucket when the count drops to zero. The existing scan in route4_delete goes away with it. The count is updated at all sites that link or unlink a filter during add, change and delete, and the bucket is dropped from head->table[] as soon as it reaches zero. Conditions to recreate the bug: CONFIG_NET_CLS_ROUTE4=y, CONFIG_NET_SCH_INGRESS=y, CONFIG_NET_CLS_ACT=y. tc qdisc replace dev lo clsact tc filter add dev lo ingress protocol ip pref 100 route from 1 to 1 tc filter change dev lo ingress protocol ip pref 100 handle 0x10001 \ route from 1 to 2 tc filter del dev lo ingress protocol ip pref 100 handle 0x10002 \ route from 1 to 2 tc filter show dev lo ingress | grep -c 'pref 100 route chain 0 '
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 5.10.271, 5.15.222, 6.1.189, 6.6.158, 6.12.111, 6.18.53, 7.2.7, 7.3
Vendor assessments
Red Hat
Red Hat rating: Low. Red Hat's page for this CVE →
| Product | Status | Plan or fix |
|---|---|---|
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 | Affected | No fix planned: Out of support scope |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
Not affected: 4 products
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9
- Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4
- Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 5
Timeline
- 2026-10-02 Threatist record created from CVE-2026-97959
- 2026-10-03 Alias added: GHSA-q5gc-9c5f-rc6r
- 2026-10-03 Fix available: Linux/Linux@41e94079200aaf0cdbe4594b0af75710b33da124, Linux/Linux@48d38bf8c22a05fde07ba1f885cde27b851649a2, Linux/[email protected] +5 · CNA
- 2026-10-03 4 new references · CNA
- 2026-10-19 Fix available: Linux/[email protected] · CNA
- 2026-11-07 Affected versions changed · Red Hat
References
Other 8
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/9e7741b41a25b9d49df4d262fa314342e6f95c50
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/48d38bf8c22a05fde07ba1f885cde27b851649a2
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/cc99d26b12431e4e4d0e346ec32764eb42c0aed9
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/41e94079200aaf0cdbe4594b0af75710b33da124
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/2e2f130951d34871b0643bf700164d97cff4b427
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/f8495d67434e1cb7e511297687ca55fdb28e4c20
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/81dd117c04422c6d0c7974aba9fa6a0ba370959b
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/1853f30cf5c84971f99788a76207c6f745380896
More Linux vulnerabilities
- TI-2025-26358 tls: fix handling of zero-length records on the rx_list KEVCVSS 3.1CRITICAL 9.8
- TI-2026-38352 netfilter: bridge: make ebt_snat ARP rewrite writable KEVCVSS 3.1HIGH 8.8
- TI-2021-02452 Incorrect authorization in Ubuntu linux kernel KEVCVSS 3.1HIGH 8.8
- TI-2013-05264 The (1) get_user and (2) put_user API functions in the Linux kernel before 3.5.5 on the… KEVCVSS 3.1HIGH 8.8
- TI-2022-00125 Integer overflow in kernel KEVCVSS 3.1HIGH 8.4
- TI-2013-01864 The perf_swevent_init function in kernel/events/core.c in the Linux kernel before 3.8.9… KEVCVSS 3.1HIGH 8.4
Sources
- CVE-2026-97959 · CVE Program
- CVE-2026-97959 · NVD
- FIRST EPSS
- GHSA-q5gc-9c5f-rc6r · GitHub Advisory Database · CC BY 4.0
- CVE-2026-97959 · Red Hat security data · CC BY 4.0
This product uses the NVD API but is not endorsed or certified by the NVD. Sources and licences