CVE Catalog

CVE-2026-23397

HighCVSS 7.1
Published: Updated: Translated: NVD NIST

Exploitation Probability (EPSS)

Low risk
0.12%

2th percentile - higher than 2% of all known CVEs

Summary

In the Linux kernel, a vulnerability was found in the nfnetlink_osf module where missing validation of individual option lengths in TCP fingerprints can lead to NULL pointer dereference or out-of-bounds reads. An attacker can supply a malicious fingerprint with zero-length options or an invalid MSS option length, causing a system crash (Oops) or potentially other impacts.

Risk Assessment

The risk for the organization includes the possibility of a Denial of Service (DoS) attack by sending a specially crafted packet that exploits the vulnerability to trigger a kernel panic. This can lead to disruption of network services and loss of system availability.

Recommendation

It is recommended to immediately update the Linux kernel to a version containing the fix (commit validating option lengths at fingerprint addition time). Monitor official security advisories from your Linux distribution and apply the patch as soon as possible.

Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel

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Original NVD description (English source)

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: nfnetlink_osf: validate individual option lengths in fingerprints nfnl_osf_add_callback() validates opt_num bounds and string NUL-termination but does not check individual option length fields. A zero-length option causes nf_osf_match_one() to enter the option matching loop even when foptsize sums to zero, which matches packets with no TCP options where ctx->optp is NULL: Oops: general protection fault KASAN: null-ptr-deref in range [0x0000000000000000-0x0000000000000007] RIP: 0010:nf_osf_match_one (net/netfilter/nfnetlink_osf.c:98) Call Trace: nf_osf_match (net/netfilter/nfnetlink_osf.c:227) xt_osf_match_packet (net/netfilter/xt_osf.c:32) ipt_do_table (net/ipv4/netfilter/ip_tables.c:293) nf_hook_slow (net/netfilter/core.c:623) ip_local_deliver (net/ipv4/ip_input.c:262) ip_rcv (net/ipv4/ip_input.c:573) Additionally, an MSS option (kind=2) with length < 4 causes out-of-bounds reads when nf_osf_match_one() unconditionally accesses optp[2] and optp[3] for MSS value extraction. While RFC 9293 section 3.2 specifies that the MSS option is always exactly 4 bytes (Kind=2, Length=4), the check uses "< 4" rather than "!= 4" because lengths greater than 4 do not cause memory safety issues -- the buffer is guaranteed to be at least foptsize bytes by the ctx->optsize == foptsize check. Reject fingerprints where any option has zero length, or where an MSS option has length less than 4, at add time rather than trusting these values in the packet matching hot path.

Vulnerability data from NVD (NIST) · CISA KEV · EPSS