What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities

CVE-2026-68300: sctp: auth: verify auth requirement when auth_chunk is NULL

• Severity: critical (CVSS 9.8 v3.1)
• Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
• EPSS: 0.6% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
• Public exploit or detection template: none known
• Published: 2026-08-10 · updated 2026-10-19
• Weakness: CWE-287

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: sctp: auth: verify auth requirement when auth_chunk is NULL sctp_auth_chunk_verify() returns true unconditionally when chunk->auth_chunk is NULL, silently skipping authentication. This is incorrect when: 1. skb_clone() failed in the BH receive path, leaving auth_chunk NULL. In sctp_endpoint_bh_rcv() asoc is NULL for new connections, so the early sctp_auth_recv_cid() check cannot catch this. 2. No AUTH chunk precedes COOKIE-ECHO, so skb_clone() is never called and auth_chunk remains NULL. Fix by checking sctp_auth_recv_cid() when auth_chunk is NULL: if authentication is required, return false to drop the chunk; otherwise continue normally.

Affected products

• Linux kernel: 2.6.24 — fixed in 7.2

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: Linux kernel 7.2. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/18957373920caf5cdaf5cf32e5d1d7a99ca7700a
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/28c5fdce9dd955d2baf5e28987819b6d7cfaf646
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/5a022ac51ad83b4ce6c898f4b9eefc65bd26b247
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/6caf0e8590c0bf05a76b0d387726adf3a6f3725c
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/83f5031f2a6a49d696eb4cc0898345d12f9c6451
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/8e04823c120b376ef7dab14b60ebf6823aa16c14
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/a129792b3aef15002746c13522781d92ed3522c3
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/ec2e157fc9678a9bc411305a25aec3fd337d7efb

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