What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities

CVE-2026-97973: net: macb: destroy the phylink instance on the probe error path

• 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: 2026-09-25 · updated 2026-10-19

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net: macb: destroy the phylink instance on the probe error path macb_mii_init() creates a phylink instance on both of its success paths, but the probe unwind frees the netdev without destroying it, so a failing macb_alloc_tieoff() or register_netdev() leaks the instance. Destroy it at err_out_unregister_mdio, which is only reachable once macb_mii_init() has succeeded, so bp->phylink is valid there.

Affected products

• Linux kernel: 5.5 — fixed in 7.3

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: Linux kernel 7.3. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/0112aa02c7847314be599d68783d50c7e228a694
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/23b6a44ffea1c54a4232aa86ee470b21422a8cc5
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/7d059f390750152b9bd69df934198651b94fc26d
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/8558e3195664113c14a4d8fcf221b3caff41fed1
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/c1de1e7b51ab2531f564b39b51998c3d71caccd7
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/e92a45b872b035c79acde8dd0da096a72b61ff2f

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