Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:HSummary
CVE-2026-45943 is a high-severity Out-of-bounds Read (CWE-125) vulnerability in Linux Linux Kernel. Its CVSS base score is 7.1 (High).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Application or System Exploitation (T1499.004); ranked at the 3th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to SI-2 (Flaw Remediation) and SA-11 (Developer Testing and Evaluation) — see the control section below for these in your framework.
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2026-32227
Vulnerability Data
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: erofs: fix inline data read failure for ztailpacking pclusters Compressed folios for ztailpacking pclusters must be valid before adding these pclusters to I/O chains. Otherwise, z_erofs_decompress_pcluster() may assume they are…
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already valid and then trigger a NULL pointer dereference. It is somewhat hard to reproduce because the inline data is in the same block as the tail of the compressed indexes, which are usually read just before. However, it may still happen if a fatal signal arrives while read_mapping_folio() is running, as shown below: erofs: (device dm-1): z_erofs_pcluster_begin: failed to get inline data -4 Unable to handle kernel NULL pointer dereference at virtual address 0000000000000008 ... pc : z_erofs_decompress_queue+0x4c8/0xa14 lr : z_erofs_decompress_queue+0x160/0xa14 sp : ffffffc08b3eb3a0 x29: ffffffc08b3eb570 x28: ffffffc08b3eb418 x27: 0000000000001000 x26: ffffff8086ebdbb8 x25: ffffff8086ebdbb8 x24: 0000000000000001 x23: 0000000000000008 x22: 00000000fffffffb x21: dead000000000700 x20: 00000000000015e7 x19: ffffff808babb400 x18: ffffffc089edc098 x17: 00000000c006287d x16: 00000000c006287d x15: 0000000000000004 x14: ffffff80ba8f8000 x13: 0000000000000004 x12: 00000006589a77c9 x11: 0000000000000015 x10: 0000000000000000 x9 : 0000000000000000 x8 : 0000000000000000 x7 : 0000000000000000 x6 : 000000000000003f x5 : 0000000000000040 x4 : ffffffffffffffe0 x3 : 0000000000000020 x2 : 0000000000000008 x1 : 0000000000000000 x0 : 0000000000000000 Call trace: z_erofs_decompress_queue+0x4c8/0xa14 z_erofs_runqueue+0x908/0x97c z_erofs_read_folio+0x128/0x228 filemap_read_folio+0x68/0x128 filemap_get_pages+0x44c/0x8b4 filemap_read+0x12c/0x5b8 generic_file_read_iter+0x4c/0x15c do_iter_readv_writev+0x188/0x1e0 vfs_iter_read+0xac/0x1a4 backing_file_read_iter+0x170/0x34c ovl_read_iter+0xf0/0x140 vfs_read+0x28c/0x344 ksys_read+0x80/0xf0 __arm64_sys_read+0x24/0x34 invoke_syscall+0x60/0x114 el0_svc_common+0x88/0xe4 do_el0_svc+0x24/0x30 el0_svc+0x40/0xa8 el0t_64_sync_handler+0x70/0xbc el0t_64_sync+0x1bc/0x1c0 Fix this by reading the inline data before allocating and adding the pclusters to the I/O chains.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI
Why these techniques?
Kernel NULL dereference during erofs compressed read path enables local DoS via system exploitation.
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Control response
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Directly requires timely application of the kernel patch that validates compressed folios before I/O chain insertion, eliminating the NULL dereference path in z_erofs_decompress_pcluster.
Mandates proper handling of error returns from read_mapping_folio (including fatal-signal cases), which is exactly the missing check that allows invalid folios to reach decompression.
Requires developer testing and fuzzing of error paths in filesystem read/decompress code, which would have surfaced the ztailpacking folio-validity race before release.
Mitigating Controls (NIST CSF 2.0) AI
Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→CSF cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.
Secure-development practices such as bounds checking and memory-safe languages directly prevent out-of-bounds reads.
Vulnerability scanning and recording can discover instances of out-of-bounds reads after code is deployed.
Routine patching replaces vulnerable code containing out-of-bounds read flaws.
Mitigating Controls (ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Annex A) AI
Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→ISO cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.
Security testing in development and acceptance includes fuzzing and static analysis that detect out-of-bounds read defects before release.
Logging can record evidence of an out-of-bounds read but does not prevent the weakness itself.
Secure development life cycle mandates input validation and bounds checking that directly prevent out-of-bounds reads.
Application security requirements include explicit bounds and memory-safety specifications that mitigate buffer over-reads.
Secure system architecture and engineering principles require memory-safe design patterns and runtime protections against out-of-bounds access.
Secure coding standards explicitly forbid unsafe pointer arithmetic and mandate bounds-checked reads, eliminating CWE-125.