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TI-2026-84935 Aliases CVE-2026-87038

TOCTOU race in Zephyr i3c_transfer() lets user code run in kernel

Priority LOW 29CWE-367Published · Updated

Key facts

Attack vector
Local
Privileges required
Low
User interaction
None
Attack complexity
High
Impact type
—
Confidentiality · integrity · availability
High · High · High
Fix status
Fixed

Attack profile from CVSS 3.1 · CNA. Fix status from CNA.

Summary

Zephyr from 3.2.0 before 4.3.2 and from 4.4.0 before 4.5.0 has a time-of-check/time-of-use race (CWE-367) in the i3c_transfer() system call handler. The handler validates the caller's i3c_device_desc in place and then reads its bus field again during use, so a second thread in the same memory domain can change the bus after validation. A user thread that has been granted an I3C device object can win this race in builds with CONFIG_USERSPACE and an I3C controller driver, which lets the kernel call an attacker-influenced function pointer in supervisor mode and escape the userspace sandbox.

Written with Claude Haiku 5.5 from the sources below · 2026-11-04

Description from the CNA

The user-mode verification handler for the i3c_transfer() system call, z_vrfy_i3c_transfer() in drivers/i3c/i3c_handlers.c, validated the caller-supplied struct i3c_device_desc in place instead of snapshotting it. It confirmed only that the descriptor was readable by the calling thread (K_SYSCALL_MEMORY_READ()), read target->bus once to check it with K_SYSCALL_OBJ(), and then passed the caller's live pointer down. The implementation z_impl_i3c_transfer() re-reads target->bus from that user memory and dispatches through it as DEVICE_API_GET(i3c, target->bus)->i3c_xfers(...), so the bus that was validated is not necessarily the bus that is used. DEVICE_API_GET() performs no runtime type check outside CONFIG_DEVICE_API_ASSERT builds. On a build with CONFIG_USERSPACE and an I3C controller driver, a user thread that has been granted an I3C device object can exploit this with a second thread in the same memory domain: one thread calls i3c_transfer() while the other rewrites the bus field of the descriptor. The window between the check and the use spans the num_msgs validation, the message-array access check, a stack VLA allocation and a memcpy() of up to 32 struct i3c_msg, so the race is repeatable and can simply be retried until it lands. When the substitution succeeds, the kernel dereferences an attacker-chosen pointer as a struct device, loads a function pointer from the attacker-controlled api table and calls it in supervisor mode with attacker-influenced arguments. This yields kernel-mode code execution from an unprivileged user thread — a complete escape of the userspace memory-protection sandbox; lesser outcomes are an arbitrary two-level kernel read or a kernel fault. Builds without CONFIG_USERSPACE, or without an I3C driver, are unaffected. The fix copies the descriptor into a kernel-stack local with k_usermode_from_copy(), validates the bus in that copy, and dispatches on the copy, so the validated value is provably the value used.

Why it matters now

EPSS 0.00087 0th percentileScored 2026-11-07
Fix Fixed zephyr (zephyrproject): 4.3.2, 4.5.0

SSVC decision points

Not available: CISA has not published SSVC decision points for this record.

Affected products

VendorProductAffected versionsFixed inStatusSource
zephyrprojectzephyr3.2.0 to before 4.3.2; 4.4.0 to before 4.5.04.3.2, 4.5.0Patch availableCNA
  • zephyr Vendorzephyrproject Affected 3.2.0 to before 4.3.2; 4.4.0 to before 4.5.0 Fixed in 4.3.2, 4.5.0 Patch available CNA

CPE names Threatist (inferred) · 1

Inferred from how NVD named this product before; not given by a source.

CPEVersionsRoleVendor
cpe:2.3:o:zephyrproject:zephyr:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*——zephyrproject
  • cpe:2.3:o:zephyrproject:zephyr:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:* Versions — — ·zephyrproject

Remediation

Upgrade Zephyr to 4.3.2 or 4.5.0, the fixed versions listed for this flaw.

Written with Claude Haiku 5.5 from the sources below · 2026-11-04

  • Fix · CNA zephyr (zephyrproject) Fixed in 4.3.2, 4.5.0

Fixed in the same release

Records fixed by the same vendor advisory or release, as the CNA lists them.

  • Release ·

    zephyrproject zephyr 4.3.2, 4.5.0

    5 records Highest priority Priority LOW 5 LOW

    Other records, highest priority first

    • TI-2026-84933 Zephyr RTIO syscalls let user threads write kernel memoryPriority LOW 37
    • TI-2026-84937 Out-of-bounds read and write in Zephyr Bluetooth LE ControllerPriority LOW 36
    • TI-2026-84938 Inverted buffer checks in Zephyr RTIO expose kernel memoryPriority LOW 33

Timeline

  1. 2026-11-04 Threatist record created from CVE-2026-87038
  2. 2026-11-05 Priority changed: MEDIUM → LOW

References

  • TI-2026-04422 Out-of-bounds read/write in HTTP WebSocket upgrade via non-null-terminated Sec-WebSocket-Key CVSS 3.1CRITICAL 9.8
  • TI-2026-01361 dns: memory‑safety issue in the DNS name parser CVSS 3.1CRITICAL 9.8
  • TI-2026-09174 Unterminated URI buffer causes out-of-bounds read in LwM2M firmware pull (Package URI) CVSS 3.1CRITICAL 9.1
  • TI-2026-09168 Stack buffer overflow in `net_ipaddr_parse()` IPv4 address-with-port parsing in `subsys/net/ip/utils.c` CVSS 3.1CRITICAL 9.8
  • TI-2024-09625 net: lib: http_server: Buffer Under-read CVSS 3.1HIGH 8.6
  • TI-2021-02863 Usb bluetooth device ACL read cb buffer overflow CVSS 3.1CRITICAL 9.6
See all 341 →

Sources

This product uses the NVD API but is not endorsed or certified by the NVD. Sources and licences