CVE-2026-43050

About vulnerability

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

atm: lec: fix use-after-free in sock_def_readable()

A race condition exists between lec_atm_close() setting priv->lecd to NULL and concurrent access to priv->lecd in send_to_lecd(), lec_handle_bridge(), and lec_atm_send(). When the socket is freed via RCU while another thread is still using it, a use-after-free occurs in sock_def_readable() when accessing the socket’s wait queue.

The root cause is that lec_atm_close() clears priv->lecd without any synchronization, while callers dereference priv->lecd without any protection against concurrent teardown.

Fix this by converting priv->lecd to an RCU-protected pointer:

• Mark priv->lecd as __rcu in lec.h
• Use rcu_assign_pointer() in lec_atm_close() and lecd_attach() for safe pointer assignment
• Use rcu_access_pointer() for NULL checks that do not dereference the pointer in lec_start_xmit(), lec_push(), send_to_lecd() and lecd_attach()
• Use rcu_read_lock/rcu_dereference/rcu_read_unlock in send_to_lecd(), lec_handle_bridge() and lec_atm_send() to safely access lecd
• Use rcu_assign_pointer() followed by synchronize_rcu() in lec_atm_close() to ensure all readers have completed before proceeding. This is safe since lec_atm_close() is called from vcc_release() which holds lock_sock(), a sleeping lock.
• Remove the manual sk_receive_queue drain from lec_atm_close() since vcc_destroy_socket() already drains it after lec_atm_close() returns.

v2: Switch from spinlock + sock_hold/put approach to RCU to properly fix the race. The v1 spinlock approach had two issues pointed out by Eric Dumazet:

1. priv->lecd was still accessed directly after releasing the lock instead of using a local copy.
2. The spinlock did not prevent packets being queued after lec_atm_close() drains sk_receive_queue since timer and workqueue paths bypass netif_stop_queue().

Note: Syzbot patch testing was attempted but the test VM terminated unexpectedly with “Connection to localhost closed by remote host”, likely due to a QEMU AHCI emulation issue unrelated to this fix. Compile testing with “make W=1 net/atm/lec.o” passes cleanly.

Affected product:

AlmaLinux 9.2 ESU , Amazon Linux 2 ELS , CentOS 6 ELS , CentOS 7 ELS , CentOS 8.4 ELS , CentOS 8.5 ELS , CentOS Stream 8 ELS , CloudLinux 7 ELS , Debian 10 ELS , Oracle Linux 6 ELS , Oracle Linux 7 ELS , RHEL 7 ELS , TuxCare 9.6 ESU , Ubuntu 16.04 ELS , Ubuntu 18.04 ELS , Ubuntu 20.04 ELS

Affected packages:

linux @ 4.15.0 (+18 more)

Live-patch status from KernelCare for each operating system.