VulnerabilityPublished 11 Sep 2026Updated 30 Sep 2026

CVE-2026-80986: Linux kernel · net/smc: bound the peer rkey counts in SMC-Rv2 LLC messages

Affects Linux kernelSource GCVE Database

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 9.8 Critical.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 17:16 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score

9.8Critical

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

EPSS: 0.6% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 50% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.

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

Attack Vector: Network
Attack Complexity: Low
Privileges Required: None
User Interaction: None
Scope: Unchanged
Confidentiality: High
Integrity: High
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: 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: 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: High: There is a total loss of integrity, or a complete loss of protection. For example, the attacker is able to modify any/all files protected by the impacted component. Alternatively, only some files can be modified, but malicious modification would present a direct, serious consequence to 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 11 Sep 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-f5q8-wrwg-4pwh

What to do

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
Ubuntu 26.04 LTSlinux`pkg:deb/ubuntu/linux?arch=source&distro=resolute`Other threats	Affected 6.17.0-5.5 – 7.0.0-34.34 22 affected builds	Fixed in–
Ubuntu 26.04 LTSlinux-aws`pkg:deb/ubuntu/linux-aws?arch=source&distro=resolute`Other threats	Affected 6.17.0-1002.2 – 7.0.0-1013.13 14 affected builds	Fixed in–
Ubuntu 26.04 LTSlinux-azure`pkg:deb/ubuntu/linux-azure?arch=source&distro=resolute`Other threats	Affected 6.17.0-1003.3 – 7.0.0-1014.14 14 affected builds	Fixed in–
Ubuntu 26.04 LTSlinux-azure-fde`pkg:deb/ubuntu/linux-azure-fde?arch=source&distro=resolute`Other threats	Affected 7.0.0-1003.3 – 7.0.0-1013.13 8 affected builds	Fixed in–
Ubuntu 26.04 LTSlinux-gcp`pkg:deb/ubuntu/linux-gcp?arch=source&distro=resolute`Other threats	Affected 6.17.0-1002.2 – 7.0.0-1013.13 12 affected builds	Fixed in–
Ubuntu 26.04 LTSlinux-gke`pkg:deb/ubuntu/linux-gke?arch=source&distro=resolute`Other threats	Affected 7.0.0-1002.3 – 7.0.0-1007.8 5 affected builds	Fixed in–

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

AI-suggested

A fix for this vulnerability has been implemented in the Linux kernel by bounding the peer rkey counts in SMC-Rv2 LLC messages. Users should apply the official kernel updates that include this fix. Since no vendor advisory or patch links are provided, check the Linux kernel official repositories or distribution updates for the patched versions.

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net/smc: bound the peer rkey counts in SMC-Rv2 LLC messages On a link whose device has max_recv_sge == 1 there is no shared v2 receive buffer, and smc_llc_save_add_link_rkeys() takes the v2 extension from 44 bytes past the start of the queue entry's inline message: ext = (struct smc_llc_msg_add_link_v2_ext *)(llc_msg + SMC_WR_TX_SIZE); The entry is a 72-byte allocation and the extension starts at offset 68, so ext->num_rkeys at offset 94 is already past it. This happens on every SMC-Rv2 link addition, whatever the peer sends: [ 2.490065] BUG: KASAN: slab-out-of-bounds in smc_llc_save_add_link_rkeys+0x333/0x350 [ 2.490431] Read of size 2 at addr ffff8880056406de by task smctest/106 [ 2.490709] [ 2.490792] CPU: 0 UID: 0 PID: 106 Comm: smctest Not tainted 7.2.0-rc5-p1-g77a5d9d9c99f #32 PREEMPT(lazy) [ 2.490795] Hardware name: QEMU Ubuntu 24.04 PC v2 (i440FX + PIIX, arch_caps fix, 1996), BIOS 1.16.3-debian-1.16.3-2 04/01/2014 [ 2.490798] Call Trace: [ 2.490803] <TASK> [ 2.490805] dump_stack_lvl+0x53/0x70 [ 2.490810] print_report+0xd0/0x630 [ 2.490828] ? __pfx__raw_spin_lock_irqsave+0x10/0x10 [ 2.490832] ? smc_llc_save_add_link_rkeys+0x333/0x350 [ 2.490834] kasan_report+0xce/0x100 [ 2.490836] ? smc_llc_save_add_link_rkeys+0x333/0x350 [ 2.490837] smc_llc_save_add_link_rkeys+0x333/0x350 [ 2.490839] ? smcr_buf_map_lgr+0x1bf/0x2b0 [ 2.490844] smc_llc_cli_add_link+0xca7/0x1e80 [ 2.490848] ? smc_llc_wait+0x355/0x810 [ 2.490850] ? __pfx_smc_llc_wait+0x10/0x10 [ 2.490851] ? __pfx_smc_llc_cli_add_link+0x10/0x10 [ 2.490853] ? __pfx_autoremove_wake_function+0x10/0x10 [ 2.490863] __smc_connect+0x3f5c/0x4980 [ 2.490873] ? __pfx_kernel_connect+0x10/0x10 [ 2.490888] ? __pfx___smc_connect+0x10/0x10 [ 2.490891] ? release_sock+0x148/0x1d0 [ 2.490894] smc_connect+0x42c/0x580 [ 2.490896] __sys_connect+0xfc/0x130 [ 2.490898] ? __pfx___sys_connect+0x10/0x10 [ 2.490900] ? handle_mm_fault+0x1a1/0x430 [ 2.490908] __x64_sys_connect+0x6d/0xb0 [ 2.490909] ? fpregs_assert_state_consistent+0x56/0xe0 [ 2.490917] do_syscall_64+0xf9/0x540 [ 2.490921] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f [ 2.490924] RIP: 0033:0x421bb4 [ 2.490927] Code: ff f7 d8 64 89 01 48 83 c8 ff c3 66 2e 0f 1f 84 00 00 00 00 00 90 f3 0f 1e fa 80 3d ad 34 09 00 00 74 13 b8 2a 00 00 00 0f 05 <48> 3d 00 f0 ff ff 77 4c c3 0f 1f 00 55 48 89 e5 48 83 ec 10 89 55 [ 2.490929] RSP: 002b:00007ffd473b01a8 EFLAGS: 00000202 ORIG_RAX: 000000000000002a [ 2.490935] RAX: ffffffffffffffda RBX: 0000000000000000 RCX: 0000000000421bb4 [ 2.490936] RDX: 0000000000000010 RSI: 00007ffd473b01d0 RDI: 0000000000000003 [ 2.490937] RBP: 0000000000003930 R08: 0000000000000004 R09: 0000000000000000 [ 2.490938] R10: 00007ffd473b0f98 R11: 0000000000000202 R12: 0000000000000006 [ 2.490939] R13: 00007ffd473b0f87 R14: 0000000000000003 R15: 00007ffd473b0f90 [ 2.490940] </TASK> [ 2.490941] [ 2.499545] Allocated by task 44: [ 2.499693] kasan_save_stack+0x33/0x60 [ 2.499860] kasan_save_track+0x14/0x30 [ 2.500026] __kasan_kmalloc+0x8f/0xa0 [ 2.500190] __kmalloc_cache_noprof+0x158/0x370 [ 2.500393] smc_llc_enqueue+0x72/0x560 [ 2.500559] smc_wr_rx_tasklet_fn+0x474/0xa80 [ 2.500747] tasklet_action_common+0x20f/0x8a0 [ 2.500945] handle_softirqs+0x18e/0x590 [ 2.501115] do_softirq+0x3b/0x60 [ 2.501266] __local_bh_enable_ip+0x61/0x70 [ 2.501446] __alloc_skb+0x732/0x890 [ 2.501604] rxe_init_packet+0x16b/0x4f0 [ 2.501783] prepare_ack_packet+0xb8/0x830 [ 2.501962] rxe_receiver+0x495/0x96e0 [ 2.502125] do_work+0x144/0x470 [ 2.502269] process_one_work+0x633/0x1030 [ 2.502450] worker_thread+0x45b/0xd10 [ 2.50261 ---truncated---

Impact

This vulnerability can cause kernel memory corruption due to out-of-bounds reads in the net/smc subsystem during SMC-Rv2 link additions. Such corruption may lead to system instability or crashes. There is no indication of active exploitation in the wild or direct remote exploitation vectors provided in the data.

Summary

The Linux kernel vulnerability (CVE-2026-80986) concerns the net/smc subsystem's handling of SMC-Rv2 LLC messages. Specifically, when a device's link has max_recv_sge set to 1, the function smc_llc_save_add_link_rkeys reads beyond the allocated 72-byte buffer by accessing the extension structure at an offset that exceeds the buffer size. This out-of-bounds read triggers a KASAN slab-out-of-bounds error, indicating potential kernel memory corruption during every SMC-Rv2 link addition. The vulnerability was identified and resolved by bounding the peer rkey counts in the SMC-Rv2 LLC messages.

References

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 12 Sep 2026, 01:21 UTC

Technical details

References

Community reviews

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