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CVE-2026-64581

7.8 HIGH

Published 2026-08-05 · Updated 2026-08-08

AI risk analysis

Summary
This vulnerability in the Linux kernel allows a race condition where a per-socket policy change can race with a send operation, leading to a double-free of the socket's dst cache, potentially causing a kernel crash or denial of service.
Exploitability
Exploitation requires a race condition between a policy change and a send operation on a connected UDP socket. This is relatively difficult to exploit due to the need for precise timing and coordination.
Blast radius
If exploited, this could result in a kernel crash or denial of service for the affected system, impacting availability and potentially leading to further vulnerabilities if the kernel panics or crashes.
Detection
No reliable host or network indicator is derivable from the published description.
Prioritized remediation
Upgrade to the fixed version 5.19.10 or later.
kernelrace-conditiondenial-of-service

Analysis generated locally by qwen2.5:7b-instruct (no data left the box). AI-assisted — verify against primary sources before acting.

NVD description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: xfrm: fix sk_dst_cache double-free in xfrm_user_policy() xfrm_user_policy() clears the socket dst cache with __sk_dst_reset(), i.e. the non-atomic __sk_dst_set(sk, NULL): it reads sk_dst_cache with rcu_dereference_protected(), stores NULL and dst_release()s the old dst. That is only safe if no other thread modifies sk_dst_cache concurrently. For a connected UDP socket that does not hold: the transmit fast path (udp_sendmsg -> sk_dst_check -> sk_dst_reset) resets the cache locklessly with an atomic xchg(). A per-socket policy change racing a send can make both sides observe the same old dst and each dst_release() it, dropping the socket's single reference twice and freeing the xfrm_dst bundle while it is still referenced: BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in dst_release Write of size 4 at addr ffff88801897b6c0 by task exploit/155 Call Trace: ... dst_release (... ./include/linux/rcuref.h:109) xfrm_user_policy (./include/net/sock.h:2239 ./include/net/sock.h:2256 net/xfrm/xfrm_state.c:3053) do_ip_setsockopt (net/ipv4/ip_sockglue.c:1347) ip_setsockopt (net/ipv4/ip_sockglue.c:1417) do_sock_setsockopt (net/socket.c:2368) __sys_setsockopt (net/socket.c:2393) __x64_sys_setsockopt (net/socket.c:2396) do_syscall_64 (arch/x86/entry/syscall_64.c:94) entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe (arch/x86/entry/entry_64.S:121) Reachable by an unprivileged user via a user+network namespace. Use the atomic sk_dst_reset() so the cache is cleared and released with a single xchg(): whichever side wins releases the dst once, the other sees NULL and does nothing. Behaviour is otherwise unchanged.

CVSS vector

CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

References

Data: NVD (public domain). Analysis: local $0 model. Defensive use only.