CVE-2026-68162

HighCVSS 7.8

Published: 10/08/2026(UTC)Updated: 23/08/2026(UTC)Translated: 10/08/2026(UTC)NVD NIST

Exploitation Probability (EPSS)

Low risk

0.16%

6th percentile - higher than 6% of all known CVEs

Summary

In the Linux kernel, the SCTP protocol has a use-after-free vulnerability in the auth_enable sysctl during network namespace teardown. The sysctl registration was performed before the control socket was created, allowing access to a non-existent object. The fix moves sysctl registration to sctp_ctrlsock_init() and properly handles unregistration.

Risk Assessment

The risk includes the possibility of exploiting use-after-free to gain unauthorized access or cause system crashes during network namespace teardown.

Recommendation

It is recommended to update the Linux kernel to a version containing the fix that moves SCTP sysctl registration to sctp_ctrlsock_init().

Original NVD description (English source)

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: sctp: avoid auth_enable sysctl UAF during netns teardown proc_sctp_do_auth() updates the SCTP control socket after changing net.sctp.auth_enable. The handler gets the per-net SCTP state from ctl->data, so an already opened sysctl file can still target a network namespace while that namespace is being torn down. SCTP previously registered its per-net sysctls from sctp_defaults_init(), while the control socket is created later from sctp_ctrlsock_init(). This exposed a window during initialization where auth_enable was writable before net->sctp.ctl_sock existed, and a teardown window where auth_enable stayed writable after inet_ctl_sock_destroy() had released the control socket. Move the per-net SCTP sysctl registration into sctp_ctrlsock_init() after sctp_ctl_sock_init() succeeds, and unregister the sysctl table before destroying the control socket in sctp_ctrlsock_exit(). If sysctl registration fails after the control socket was created, destroy the control socket in the same init path. Make sctp_sysctl_net_unregister() tolerate a missing header and clear the saved pointer so init-error and exit paths can safely share the unregister helper.