CVE-2026-72188
Received
Received - Intake
NTFS MFT Reference Validation Flaw in Linux Kernel
Vulnerability report for CVE-2026-72188, including description, CVSS score, EPSS score, affected products, exploitability, helpful resources, and attack-flow context.
Publication date: 2026-08-15
Last updated on: 2026-08-15
Assigner: kernel.org
Description
Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
ntfs: sanitize MFT references returned from ntfs_lookup_inode_by_name()
ntfs_lookup_inode_by_name() returns MFT references read from directory
index entries on disk. These values are untrusted, but the function can
currently return an error-marked MFT reference to its callers without
validating it.
Callers later decode lookup failures with MREF_ERR(). A crafted NTFS image
can set the MREF error bit while leaving the low bits as an arbitrary
value, causing callers to consume a bogus pseudo-errno instead of treating
the lookup result as corrupted on-disk metadata.
Fix this at the source by normalizing every error-marked MFT reference
returned from ntfs_lookup_inode_by_name() to ERR_MREF(-EIO). Apply this to
all four directory lookup return paths so every caller gets a validated
result without needing additional checks or an API change.
This keeps the sanitization in the common lookup helper, which is cleaner
than duplicating validation in each caller.
CVSS Scores
EPSS Scores
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Meta Information
Affected Vendors & Products
| Vendor | Product | Version / Range |
|---|---|---|
| linux | linux_kernel | to 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67 (inc) |
Helpful Resources
Exploitability
CWE
KEV
| CWE ID | Description |
|---|---|
| CWE-UNKNOWN |
