VulnerabilityPublished 30 Jun 2026Updated 15 Oct 2026

CVE-2026-10655: zephyrproject zephyr · Use After Free

Affects zephyrproject zephyrSource CVE Database V5

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Not known to be exploited · CVSS 6.5 Medium : upgrade to 4.4.2 or 4.3.1 when convenient.

Data as of 13 Nov 2026, 23:53 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score

6.5Medium

How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.

EPSS: 0.3% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 32% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.
Patch: Available – fixed in 4.4.2, 4.3.1

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:H

Attack Vector: Network
Attack Complexity: High
Privileges Required: None
User Interaction: None
Scope: Unchanged
Confidentiality: None
Integrity: Low
Availability: High

Bold values are the worst case: easiest to exploit or largest impact.

Attack Vector: Network: The vulnerable component is bound to the network stack and the set of possible attackers extends beyond the other options listed, up to and including the entire Internet. Such a vulnerability is often termed 'remotely exploitable' and can be thought of as an attack being exploitable at the protocol level one or more network hops away (e.g., across one or more routers).
Attack Complexity: High: A successful attack depends on conditions beyond the attacker's control. That is, a successful attack cannot be accomplished at will, but requires the attacker to invest in some measurable amount of effort in preparation or execution against the vulnerable component before a successful attack can be expected. For example, a successful attack may require an attacker to: gather knowledge about the environment in which the vulnerable target/component exists; prepare the target environment to improve exploit reliability; or inject themselves into the logical network path between the target and the resource requested by the victim in order to read and/or modify network communications (e.g., a man in the middle attack).
Privileges Required: None: The attacker is unauthorized prior to attack, and therefore does not require any access to settings or files to carry out an attack.
User Interaction: None: The vulnerable system can be exploited without any interaction from any user.
Scope: Unchanged: An exploited vulnerability can only affect resources managed by the same security authority. In this case, the vulnerable component and the impacted component are either the same, or both are managed by the same security authority.
Confidentiality: None: There is no loss of confidentiality within the impacted component.
Integrity: Low: Modification of data is possible, but the attacker does not have control over the consequence of a modification, or the amount of modification is limited. The data modification does not have a direct, serious impact on the impacted component.
Availability: High: There is total loss of availability, resulting in the attacker being able to fully deny access to resources in the impacted component; this loss is either sustained (while the attacker continues to deliver the attack) or persistent (the condition persists even after the attack has completed). Alternatively, the attacker has the ability to deny some availability, but the loss of availability presents a direct, serious consequence to the impacted component (e.g., the attacker cannot disrupt existing connections, but can prevent new connections; the attacker can repeatedly exploit a vulnerability that, in each instance of a successful attack, leaks a only small amount of memory, but after repeated exploitation causes a service to become completely unavailable).

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v3.1 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 30 Jun 2026
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponized: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by Mirage: no evidence on record.
No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 13 Nov 2026.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponized: A Metasploit exploit module or Exploit-DB entry exists (Metasploit scanner modules do not count), or CISA SSVC or the CVSS exploit maturity reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

cwe-416

What to do

Upgrade zephyrproject zephyr to 4.4.2 or 4.3.1.

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
zephyrprojectzephyr	Affected >=4.4.0 <4.4.2	Fixed in 4.4.2
zephyrprojectzephyr	Affected >=4.2.0 <4.3.1	Fixed in 4.3.1
GitHubzephyr`pkg:github/zephyr`Other threats	Affected >=4.2.0 <4.3.1 >=4.4.0 <4.4.2	Fixed in 4.3.1 4.4.2

Check your own hosts for these packages with threat-finder (opens in a new tab), our free open-source scanner.

AI-suggested

The described fix defers socket closure to the socket service thread to eliminate the race condition. If you cannot patch yet, avoid network conditions that cause SNTP timeouts or consider disabling the asynchronous SNTP client if feasible.

Description

The asynchronous SNTP client in Zephyr (subsys/net/lib/sntp/sntp.c, sntp_close_async) closed the UDP socket file descriptor directly from the calling thread immediately after detaching it from the network socket service, without synchronizing with the socket-service poll thread. The socket service thread polls each socket via zvfs_poll, which (in zsock_poll_prepare_ctx) registers a k_poll_event pointing into the socket's net_context (&ctx->recv_q) and then blocks in k_poll without holding a reference or lock. net_context objects are allocated from a fixed pool (contexts[CONFIG_NET_MAX_CONTEXTS]) and reused after close. When sntp_close_async is invoked from a different thread than the poll thread (in the in-tree consumer subsys/net/lib/config/init_clock_sntp.c, the SNTP timeout handler runs on the system workqueue while the socket service thread is blocked in poll on the same fd), the close frees and may reuse the net_context while the poll thread still has a poller node linked into the freed object, resulting in a use-after-free / object confusion of kernel poll structures. The SNTP timeout path is the normal no-response failure mode, so a network peer or off-path attacker who drops or delays the SNTP/NTP response can drive the racing close repeatedly (and periodically with NET_CONFIG_SNTP_INIT_RESYNC). The most likely consequence is a crash of the networking thread (denial of service), with potential memory corruption when the freed context slot is reallocated. The fix defers the close to the socket service thread itself via net_socket_service_close (NET_SOCKET_SERVICE_CLOSE_SOCKETS), so the same thread that polls performs the close, eliminating the race. Affected releases: v4.2.0 through v4.4.0.

Impact

The vulnerability can cause a denial of service by crashing the networking thread due to use-after-free of kernel poll structures. There is also potential for memory corruption when the freed net_context slot is reallocated. No direct confidentiality or integrity impact is described. The attack vector is network-based, requiring an attacker to drop or delay SNTP/NTP responses to trigger the race condition.

Summary

The vulnerability in Zephyr's asynchronous SNTP client arises from closing the UDP socket file descriptor immediately after detaching it from the network socket service without synchronization with the socket-service poll thread. The poll thread registers poll events pointing into net_context objects, which are freed and potentially reused by the close operation running on a different thread. This race condition leads to use-after-free and object confusion in kernel poll structures. The typical trigger is the SNTP timeout path, where delayed or dropped SNTP/NTP responses cause repeated racing closes. The fix defers socket closure to the socket service thread itself, ensuring the same thread that polls also performs the close, thus preventing the race. Affected versions are Zephyr v4.2.0 through v4.4.0.

References

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 15 Jul 2026, 10:47 UTC

Technical details

References

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