CVE-2026-90077 PUBLISHED

net: fix a resource leak in copy_net_ns() error handling path

Assigner: Linux
Reserved: 11.09.2026 Published: 17.09.2026 Updated: 17.09.2026

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

net: fix a resource leak in copy_net_ns() error handling path

Currently, preinit_net() does two things:

(1) call ns_common_init() which might fail (2) initialize resources which does not fail

However, preinit_net() is returning early when (1) fails, and copy_net_ns() is jumping to the dec_ucounts: label. As a result, resources allocated by net_alloc() are leaking. We need to call key_remove_domain() and net_passive_dec() in order to release resources allocated by net_alloc().

We cannot simply jump to the put_userns: label when preinit_net() failed, for (2) is not yet done. But we can reorder (1) and (2), for there is no dependency between (1) and (2). Therefore, this patch decouples (1) from preinit_net() and changes preinit_net() back to a void function, and calls ns_common_init() after preinit_net() succeeded. Then, we can jump to immediately after ns_common_free() of the put_userns: label.

Product Status

Vendor Linux
Product Linux
Versions Default: unaffected
  • affected from 08027f6b790be1e444e4182fb4dc53faa6539d16 to 76c847e80d2b6be047707d58e8e05eedbe2593ad (excl.)
  • affected from 08027f6b790be1e444e4182fb4dc53faa6539d16 to e69bde4eb566aea8fa97cbb93e0bab608964f1a5 (excl.)
  • affected from 08027f6b790be1e444e4182fb4dc53faa6539d16 to 3220b62fbb8a55feebd2a826d5ead0f49f09ed5a (excl.)
Vendor Linux
Product Linux
Versions Default: affected
  • Version 6.18 is affected
  • unaffected from 0 to 6.18 (excl.)
  • unaffected from 6.18.52 to 6.18.* (incl.)
  • unaffected from 7.2.6 to 7.2.* (incl.)
  • unaffected from 7.3-rc1 to * (incl.)

References