CVE-2026-22983 PUBLISHED

net: do not write to msg_get_inq in callee

Assigner: Linux
Reserved: 13.01.2026 Published: 23.01.2026 Updated: 23.01.2026

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

net: do not write to msg_get_inq in callee

NULL pointer dereference fix.

msg_get_inq is an input field from caller to callee. Don't set it in the callee, as the caller may not clear it on struct reuse.

This is a kernel-internal variant of msghdr only, and the only user does reinitialize the field. So this is not critical for that reason. But it is more robust to avoid the write, and slightly simpler code. And it fixes a bug, see below.

Callers set msg_get_inq to request the input queue length to be returned in msg_inq. This is equivalent to but independent from the SO_INQ request to return that same info as a cmsg (tp->recvmsg_inq). To reduce branching in the hot path the second also sets the msg_inq. That is WAI.

This is a fix to commit 4d1442979e4a ("af_unix: don't post cmsg for SO_INQ unless explicitly asked for"), which fixed the inverse.

Also avoid NULL pointer dereference in unix_stream_read_generic if state->msg is NULL and msg->msg_get_inq is written. A NULL state->msg can happen when splicing as of commit 2b514574f7e8 ("net: af_unix: implement splice for stream af_unix sockets").

Also collapse two branches using a bitwise or.

Product Status

Vendor Linux
Product Linux
Versions Default: unaffected
  • affected from 089e50f29eeec8eef6ae1450fc88138d719291cb to ffa2be496ef65055b28b39c6bd9a7d66943ee89a (excl.)
  • affected from 4d1442979e4a53b9457ce1e373e187e1511ff688 to 7d11e047eda5f98514ae62507065ac961981c025 (excl.)
Vendor Linux
Product Linux
Versions Default: affected
  • Version 6.19-rc4 is affected
  • unaffected from 0 to 6.19-rc4 (excl.)
  • unaffected from 6.18.6 to 6.18.* (incl.)
  • unaffected from 6.19-rc5 to * (incl.)

References