CVE-2026-74400: bpf: fix crash in bpf_[set|remove]_dentry_xattr for negative dentries

Severity: unknown
Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
EPSS: 0.2% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
Public exploit or detection template: none known
Published: 2026-08-15 · updated 2026-08-17

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: bpf: fix crash in bpf_[set|remove]_dentry_xattr for negative dentries bpf_set_dentry_xattr and bpf_remove_dentry_xattr BPF kfuncs attempt to lock the inode of the supplied dentry without checking if it is NULL. If a negative dentry is passed (e.g. from security_inode_create), d_inode(dentry) returns NULL, and inode_lock(inode) will cause a NULL pointer dereference. Trivially fix this by adding a NULL check for inode before attempting to lock it, returning -EINVAL if it is NULL. Additionally, drop WARN_ON(!inode) in bpf_xattr_read_permission() and bpf_xattr_write_permission(). These warnings could be triggered by passing a negative dentry to bpf_get_dentry_xattr() or the _locked variants of the xattr kfuncs, potentially causing a Denial of Service on systems with panic_on_warn enabled. Instead, simply return -EINVAL.

Affected products

Linux kernel: 6.15 — fixed in 7.2

How to fix

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

References

Get alerted when CVE-2026-74400 or the next vulnerability affects your stack