Linux hwe edge: In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: eventfs: Use children field for rcu head and add memory barriers When an eventfs… (CVE-2026-74605)

The Linux kernel eventfs subsystem had a vulnerability where, upon freeing an eventfs inode, the inode's list field (a union with the RCU list head) was used in SRCU-protected list iteration without proper synchronization. This allowed iteration to potentially access the ei->rcu field instead of ei->list, causing corrupt memory reads. The fix involved changing the union to use the children list for the RCU head, setting the is_freed flag with a write memory barrier (smp_wmb()) before adding the inode to the SRCU list, and using a read memory barrier (smp_rmb()) plus checking is_freed at the start of iteration to ensure the children list is valid. This prevents use-after-free conditions and memory corruption during SRCU list traversal.

This vulnerability could lead to reading corrupt memory during SRCU-protected list iteration in the eventfs subsystem, potentially causing system instability or security issues such as information disclosure or privilege escalation. The CVSS score of 7.8 indicates a high impact on confidentiality, integrity, and availability, though the attack vector requires local access with low privileges and no user interaction.

A fix has been implemented in the Linux kernel eventfs subsystem that addresses this vulnerability by adding proper memory barriers and validity checks. Users should apply the official kernel updates that include this patch. Since this is a kernel-level issue, updating to the fixed kernel version is the recommended remediation. No additional mitigations are indicated.