CVE-2026-53260

Status: UPDATED  |  Advisory ID: CVE-2026-53260

Key Details

Affected Products, Subsystems & Sectors

What to Know

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

tcp: Add preempt_{disable,enable}_nested() in reqsk_queue_hash_req().

syzbot reported a weird reqsk->rsk_refcnt underflow in

__inet_csk_reqsk_queue_drop().

The captured reqsk_put() in __inet_csk_reqsk_queue_drop()

is called only when it successfully removes reqsk from ehash.

Moreover, reqsk_timer_handler() calls another reqsk_put()

after that.

This indicates that the reqsk was missing both refcnts for

ehash and the timer itself.

Since all the syzbot reports had PREEMPT_RT enabled, the only

possible scenario is that reqsk_queue_hash_req() is preempted

after mod_timer() and before refcount_set(), and then the timer

triggered after 1s aborts the reqsk due to its listener's close().

Let's wrap mod_timer() and refcount_set() with

preempt_disable_nested() and preempt_enable_nested().

Note that inet_ehash_insert() holds the normal spin_lock()

(mutex in PREEMPT_RT), so it must be called outside of

preempt_disable_nested(), but this is fine.

The lookup path just ignores 0 sk_refcnt entries in ehash

and tries to create another reqsk, but this will fail at

inet_ehash_insert().

[0]:

refcount_t: underflow; use-after-free.

WARNING: lib/refcount.c:28 at refcount_warn_saturate+0xb2/0x110 lib/refcount.c:28, CPU#0: ktimers/0/16

Modules linked in:

CPU: 0 UID: 0 PID: 16 Comm: ktimers/0 Tainted: G L syzkaller #0 PREEMPT_{RT,(full)}

Tainted: [L]=SOFTLOCKUP

Hardware name: Google Google Compute Engine/Google Compute Engine, BIOS Google 04/18/2026

RIP: 0010:refcount_warn_saturate+0xb2/0x110 lib/refcount.c:28

Code: e4 7d d1 0a 67 48 0f b9 3a eb 4a e8 38 3d 23 fd 48 8d 3d e1 7d d1 0a 67 48 0f b9 3a eb 37 e8 25 3d 23 fd 48 8d 3d de 7d d1 0a <67> 48 0f b9 3a eb 24 e8 12 3d 23 fd 48 8d 3d db 7d d1 0a 67 48 0f

RSP: 0000:ffffc90000157948 EFLAGS: 00010246

RAX: ffffffff84a1301b RBX: 0000000000000003 RCX: ffff88801ca98000

RDX: 0000000000000100 RSI: 0000000000000000 RDI: ffffffff8f72ae00

RBP: ffffffff99ae3b01 R08: ffff88801ca98000 R09: 0000000000000005

R10: 0000000000000100 R11: 0000000000000004 R12: ffff8880425ef568

R13: ffff8880425ef4f8 R14: ffff8880425ef578 R15: 0000000000000000

FS: 0000000000000000(0000) GS:ffff888126386000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000

CS: 0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033

CR2: 00007f7b46710e9c CR3: 000000000dbb6000 CR4: 00000000003526f0

Call Trace:

<TASK>

__refcount_sub_and_test include/linux/refcount.h:400 [inline]

__refcount_dec_and_test include/linux/refcount.h:432 [inline]

refcount_dec_and_test include/linux/refcount.h:450 [inline]

reqsk_put include/net/request_sock.h:136 [inline]

__inet_csk_reqsk_queue_drop+0x3ce/0x440 net/ipv4/inet_connection_sock.c:1007

reqsk_timer_handler+0x651/0xdf0 net/ipv4/inet_connection_sock.c:1137

call_timer_fn+0x192/0x5e0 kernel/time/timer.c:1748

expire_timers kernel/time/timer.c:1799 [inline]

__run_timers kernel/time/timer.c:2374 [inline]

__run_timer_base+0x6a3/0x9f0 kernel/time/timer.c:2386

run_timer_base kernel/time/timer.c:2395 [inline]

run_timer_softirq+0x67/0x170 kernel/time/timer.c:2403

handle_softirqs+0x1de/0x6d0 kernel/softirq.c:622

__do_softirq kernel/softirq.c:656 [inline]

run_ktimerd+0x69/0x100 kernel/softirq.c:1151

smpboot_thread_fn+0x541/0xa50 kernel/smpboot.c:160

kthread+0x388/0x470 kernel/kthread.c:436

ret_from_fork+0x514/0xb70 arch/x86/kernel/process.c:158

ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30 arch/x86/entry/entry_64.S:245

</TASK> (NVD)

What to Do

Monitor Linux's web page for any future patch releases.

References