CVE-2026-74601
Received
Received - Intake
Race Condition in Linux Kernel Ring Buffer
Vulnerability report for CVE-2026-74601, including description, CVSS score, EPSS score, affected products, exploitability, helpful resources, and attack-flow context.
Publication date: 2026-08-22
Last updated on: 2026-08-22
Assigner: kernel.org
Description
Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
ring-buffer: Use current_context for safe per-CPU buffer swap
The ring_buffer_swap_cpu() function currently checks the per-CPU
committing counter to determine if a buffer is actively being written to
before performing the swap. However, there exists a race window where
this check can be bypassed:
ring_buffer_lock_reserve
cpu_buffer = buffer->buffers[cpu]; // cpu_buffer_a
rb_reserve_next_event
rb_start_commit // inc committing
if (unlikely(READ_ONCE(cpu_buffer->buffer) != buffer)) {...}
__rb_reserve_next
rb_move_tail
rb_end_commit(cpu_buffer); // dec committing => 0
/* interrupt hits here, successfully swaps! */
local_inc(&cpu_buffer->committing);
ring_buffer_unlock_commit
cpu_buffer = buffer->buffers[cpu]; // cpu_buffer_b
rb_commit
rb_end_commit
RB_WARN_ON(cpu_buffer, !local_read(&cpu_buffer->committing))
// triggers warning
The committing counter can temporarily drop to 0 during a single write
operation (within rb_move_tail), creating a window where swap can
succeed even though the write is still in progress. This leads to
inconsistent buffer state and triggers the RB_WARN_ON in rb_commit().
Replace the committing counter check with current_context checks, which
are set at the entry of ring_buffer_lock_reserve() and remain valid
throughout the entire write operation, providing a reliable indicator of
buffer busy state during swap.
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 |
