Expired Pointer Dereference Affecting kernel-modules-internal package, versions *


Severity

Recommended
medium

Based on Red Hat Enterprise Linux security rating.

Threat Intelligence

EPSS
0.18% (8th percentile)

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  • Snyk IDSNYK-RHEL8-KERNELMODULESINTERNAL-21038671
  • published16 Oct 2026
  • disclosed6 Oct 2026

Introduced: 6 Oct 2026

NewCVE-2026-98342  (opens in a new tab)
CWE-825  (opens in a new tab)

How to fix?

There is no fixed version for RHEL:8 kernel-modules-internal.

NVD Description

Note: Versions mentioned in the description apply only to the upstream kernel-modules-internal package and not the kernel-modules-internal package as distributed by RHEL. See How to fix? for RHEL:8 relevant fixed versions and status.

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

dmaengine: wait for RCU readers before releasing dma_device

dma_issue_pending_all() walks the dma_device_list with list_for_each_entry_rcu() under rcu_read_lock(). dma_device_release() unlinks the device with list_del_rcu() and then calls device->device_release() (which in many drivers, such as plx_dma.c, directly calls kfree()).

Because there is no grace period between unlinking the device and freeing it, concurrent RCU readers in dma_issue_pending_all() can access the device after it has been freed.

The lockless walk originally relied on clients holding a dmaengine reference to pin the provider module, and therefore the device, for as long as they might traverse the list. Commit 8ad342a86359 ("dmaengine: Add reference counting to dma_device struct") decoupled the dma_device lifetime from the module reference, so the device can now be released while a reader is still walking the list.

Add synchronize_rcu() before the device is freed, so RCU readers are guaranteed to have finished. Keep it unconditional: providers that do not implement device_release() free the device themselves once dma_async_device_unregister() returns. This call will delay for a grace period with dma_list_mutex held, which is safe and only teardown path is delayed.

CVSS Base Scores

version 3.1