VulnerabilityPublished 19 Jul 2026Updated 24 Jul 2026

CVE-2026-53390: Linux kernel · ksmbd: fix out-of-bounds read in smb_check_perm_dacl()

Source GCVE Database

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 8.1 High.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 17:16 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score

8.1High

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

EPSS: 0.4% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 40% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.

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

Attack Vector: Network
Attack Complexity: Low
Privileges Required: Low
User Interaction: None
Scope: Unchanged
Confidentiality: High
Integrity: None
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: Low: Specialized access conditions or extenuating circumstances do not exist. An attacker can expect repeatable success against the vulnerable component.
Privileges Required: Low: The attacker is authorized with (i.e., requires) privileges that provide basic user capabilities that could normally affect only settings and files owned by a user. Alternatively, an attacker with Low privileges may have the ability to cause an impact only to non-sensitive resources.
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: High: There is total loss of confidentiality, resulting in all resources within the impacted component being divulged to the attacker. Alternatively, access to only some restricted information is obtained, but the disclosed information presents a direct, serious impact.
Integrity: None: There is no loss of integrity within 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 19 Jul 2026
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: 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 26 Oct 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.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, 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.

ghsa-xg8q-rr62-82pp

What to do

AI-suggested

A fix has been implemented in the Linux kernel to add the missing validation check for ACE size against the number of sub-authorities in smb_check_perm_dacl(). Users and administrators should apply the official Linux kernel updates that include this patch. Since this is not a cloud service, remediation depends on applying the updated kernel version. Patch status is not explicitly confirmed in the provided data; check the vendor advisory or Linux kernel mailing lists for the specific fixed versions and update accordingly.

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: ksmbd: fix out-of-bounds read in smb_check_perm_dacl() The permission-check ACE walk in smb_check_perm_dacl() validates the ACE header size and caps sid.num_subauth at SID_MAX_SUB_AUTHORITIES, but it never checks that ace->size is actually large enough to contain num_subauth sub-authorities before compare_sids() dereferences them. CIFS_SID_BASE_SIZE covers the SID header up to but excluding the sub_auth[] array, and offsetof(struct smb_ace, sid) is the ACE header, so the existing guards only guarantee the 8-byte SID base, i.e. zero sub-authorities. compare_sids() then reads ace->sid.sub_auth[i] for i < min(local_sid->num_subauth, ace->sid.num_subauth). The local comparison SIDs (sid_everyone, sid_unix_NFS_mode, and the id_to_sid() result) always have at least one sub-authority, and an attacker controls the ACE revision and authority bytes (which lie within the in-bounds SID base), so they can match one of those SIDs and force the sub_auth read. A crafted ACE with size == 16 and num_subauth >= 1 placed at the tail of the security descriptor therefore causes a heap out-of-bounds read of up to SID_MAX_SUB_AUTHORITIES * sizeof(__le32) bytes past the pntsd allocation. The security descriptor is loaded by ksmbd_vfs_get_sd_xattr() into a buffer sized exactly to the on-disk data (kzalloc(sd_size) in ndr_decode_v4_ntacl()), so the read lands past the allocation. The malformed descriptor can be stored verbatim via SMB2_SET_INFO (the DACL is not normalised before being written to the security.NTACL xattr) and the read fires on a subsequent SMB2_CREATE access check, making this reachable by an authenticated client on a share that uses ACL xattrs. Add the missing num_subauth-versus-ace_size check, mirroring the identical guards already present in the sibling parsers parse_dacl() and smb_inherit_dacl().

Impact

An authenticated client with access to an SMB share that uses ACL extended attributes can trigger a heap out-of-bounds read in the kernel during permission checks. This could potentially lead to information disclosure or kernel instability. However, no known exploits in the wild have been reported. The vulnerability affects the ksmbd component of the Linux kernel and requires authenticated access to a vulnerable share.

Summary

The Linux kernel's ksmbd module had a vulnerability (CVE-2026-53390) where smb_check_perm_dacl() performed an out-of-bounds read. Although it validated the ACE header size and capped the number of sub-authorities, it failed to ensure the ACE size was sufficient to hold all sub-authorities before compare_sids() accessed them. This allowed a crafted ACE with minimal size but a declared number of sub-authorities to cause a heap out-of-bounds read past the allocated security descriptor buffer. The malformed ACE can be stored via SMB2_SET_INFO and triggered on subsequent SMB2_CREATE access checks by an authenticated client on shares using ACL xattrs. The fix involved adding the missing check to ensure the ACE size covers all sub-authorities, aligning with existing safeguards in related parsers.

CWE-125Out-of-bounds Read (opens in a new tab)
Base weaknessCWE Top 25 (2025): #8
The product reads data past the end, or before the beginning, of the intended buffer.
Implementation · Input Validation
Assume all input is malicious. Use an "accept known good" input validation strategy, i.e., use a list of acceptable inputs that strictly conform to specifications. Reject any input that does not strictly conform to specifications, or transform it into something that does.
Architecture and Design · Language Selection
Use a language that provides appropriate memory abstractions.
OWASP Cheat Sheets
XML Security (opens in a new tab)
Mass Assignment (opens in a new tab)
OWASP ASVS 4.0.3
V13.3.1 (opens in a new tab)
V5.1.4 (opens in a new tab)
V5.1.3 (opens in a new tab)
Attack patterns
Overread Buffers (opens in a new tab)
From MITRE CWE, MITRE CAPEC and OWASP (Top 10, OpenCRE).

References

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 19 Jul 2026, 20:22 UTC

WeaknessesCWE-125

Technical details

References

Community reviews

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