CVE Catalog

CVE-2026-68441

Low risk· EPSS 5%
Published: Updated: Translated: NVD NIST

Exploitation Probability (EPSS)

Low risk
0.15%

5th percentile - higher than 5% of all known CVEs

Summary

In the Linux kernel, a vulnerability was found in the TC (Traffic Control) mechanism where packet redirects (TC_ACT_REDIRECT) from qdisc filter chains were silently ignored, causing packets not to be redirected and in some cases leading to a system crash (NULL pointer dereference) when calling bpf_redirect(). The issue affects TC filters attached to qdisc that return TC_ACT_REDIRECT (e.g., via eBPF).

Risk Assessment

The organization may experience unexpected packet loss or system crashes when using eBPF redirects in TC configurations. An attacker with the ability to load eBPF or control network traffic could exploit this vulnerability to disrupt network services.

Recommendation

It is recommended to immediately update the Linux kernel to a version containing the fix (commit resolving the issue). Until the update is applied, avoid using bpf_redirect() in qdisc filters or temporarily disable such configurations.

Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel

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Original NVD description (English source)

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net/sched: Handle TC_ACT_REDIRECT from qdisc filter chains When a TC filter attached to a qdisc filter chain returns TC_ACT_REDIRECT (ex: via an eBPF program calling bpf_redirect() or an act_bpf action), the redirect was silently lost i.e no qdisc classify function handled TC_ACT_REDIRECT, so the packet fell through the switch and was enqueued normally instead of being redirected. This has been broken since bpf_redirect() was introduced for TC in commit 27b29f63058d ("bpf: add bpf_redirect() helper"). We got lucky for a long time because bpf_net_context was a per-CPU variable that was always available. commit 401cb7dae813 ("net: Reference bpf_redirect_info via task_struct on PREEMPT_RT.") turned bpf_net_context into a task_struct member that is only set up by explicit callers. Without a caller setting it up, bpf_redirect() itself crashes with a NULL pointer dereference in bpf_net_ctx_get_ri(). However, even with bpf_net_context available, TC_ACT_REDIRECT from qdisc filter chains cannot be honored without adding skb_do_redirect() calls to every qdisc classify function, which would require changes across net/sched/. Isolate it to ebpf core where it belongs. Instead, add a tcf_classify_qdisc() inline helper in pkt_cls.h, as a wrapper around tcf_classify() for use by qdisc classify functions and tcf_qevent_handle(). When the classify verdict is TC_ACT_REDIRECT, the wrapper converts it to TC_ACT_SHOT, dropping the packet rather than letting it continue silently. Dropping is preferred over letting the packet through because the user immediately sees packet loss. Silently passing the packet through would hide the problem and leave the user wondering why their redirect is not working. The clsact fast path, tc_run() continues to call tcf_classify() directly and is unaffected: TC_ACT_REDIRECT is returned as-is and handled by sch_handle_egress/ingress() calling skb_do_redirect() as before.

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