CVE-2026-89972

9.8 CRITICAL

Published 2026-09-16 · Updated 2026-09-16

AI risk analysis

Summary: This flaw allows a concurrent reader to hold a reference to an ns struct after it has been removed from the namespace head siblings list, leading to potential memory corruption or other issues when kfree(ns) runs.
Exploitability: Exploitation requires concurrent access by multipath code during namespace removal, making it moderately difficult but feasible with specific conditions.
Blast radius: If exploited, this could lead to severe system instability or security vulnerabilities affecting the Linux kernel's stability and integrity.
Prioritized remediation: Apply the patch that adds a SRCU grace period in the error path of nvme_alloc_ns() to ensure proper synchronization before freeing the namespace struct.

kernelmemory-corruptionsrcustability

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: nvme: add missing SRCU grace period in error path nvme_alloc_ns() error path at out_unlink_ns removes ns from the namespace head siblings list with list_del_rcu(&ns->siblings) but does not wait for SRCU readers before freeing the namespace struct. Multipath code iterates the head->list under srcu_read_lock() in nvme_find_path() and nvme_mpath_revalidate_paths(), so a concurrent reader can still hold a reference to ns when kfree(ns) runs. The normal removal path in nvme_ns_remove() correctly calls synchronize_srcu(&ns->head->srcu) after list_del_rcu() to wait for in-progress readers. Add the same grace period in the error path.

CVSS vector

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

All references

Source data: NVD (nvd.nist.gov), public domain. Exploit-DB.ai adds local AI analysis for defensive use only.

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