CVE-2026-31652

Summary

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

mm/damon/stat: deallocate damon_call() failure leaking damon_ctx

damon_stat_start() always allocates the module's damon_ctx object (damon_stat_context). Meanwhile, if damon_call() in the function fails, the damon_ctx object is not deallocated. Hence, if the damon_call() is failed, and the user writes Y to “enabled” again, the previously allocated damon_ctx object is leaked.

This cannot simply be fixed by deallocating the damon_ctx object when damon_call() fails. That's because damon_call() failure doesn't guarantee the kdamond main function, which accesses the damon_ctx object, is completely finished. In other words, if damon_stat_start() deallocates the damon_ctx object after damon_call() failure, the not-yet-terminated kdamond could access the freed memory (use-after-free).

Fix the leak while avoiding the use-after-free by keeping returning damon_stat_start() without deallocating the damon_ctx object after damon_call() failure, but deallocating it when the function is invoked again and the kdamond is completely terminated. If the kdamond is not yet terminated, simply return -EAGAIN, as the kdamond will soon be terminated.

The issue was discovered [1] by sashiko.

Affected Software

VendorProductVersion RangeStatus
LinuxLinux405f61996d9d2e9d497cd9f6b66f41dc28d3d1d8 < 447f8870b484f6596d7a7130e72bd0a3f1e037bbaffected
LinuxLinux405f61996d9d2e9d497cd9f6b66f41dc28d3d1d8 < 16c92e9bf55fa049ddb5e894dc0623dacd46a620affected
LinuxLinux405f61996d9d2e9d497cd9f6b66f41dc28d3d1d8 < 4c04c6b47c361612b1d70cec8f7a60b1482d1400affected
LinuxLinux6.17affected
LinuxLinux0 < 6.17unaffected
LinuxLinux6.18.23 <= 6.18.*unaffected
LinuxLinux6.19.13 <= 6.19.*unaffected
LinuxLinux7.0 <= *unaffected

Weaknesses

References