CVE-2026-72368
Received
Received - Intake
Double Unlock in Linux Kernel cachefiles
Vulnerability report for CVE-2026-72368, 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:
cachefiles: Fix double unlock in nomem_d_alloc error path
When start_creating() fails and returns -ENOMEM, it has already
released the parent directory lock in __start_dirop():
static struct dentry *__start_dirop(...)
{
...
inode_lock_nested(dir, I_MUTEX_PARENT);
dentry = lookup_one_qstr_excl(name, parent, lookup_flags);
if (IS_ERR(dentry))
inode_unlock(dir); <-- Lock released on error
return dentry;
}
However, the nomem_d_alloc error path in cachefiles_get_directory()
unconditionally calls inode_unlock(d_inode(dir)) again, causing a
double unlock that corrupts the rwsem state.
This is a leftover from commit 7ab96df840e60 which replaced manual
locking with start_creating() but failed to update the nomem_d_alloc
path (while correctly updating mkdir_error and lookup_error paths).
CVSS Scores
EPSS Scores
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Meta Information
Affected Vendors & Products
| Vendor | Product | Version / Range |
|---|---|---|
| linux | linux_kernel | * |
Helpful Resources
Exploitability
CWE
KEV
| CWE ID | Description |
|---|---|
| CWE-UNKNOWN |
