CVE-2026-31429 (GCVE-0-2026-31429)
Vulnerability from cvelistv5
Published
2026-04-20 09:43
Modified
2026-04-20 09:43
Severity ?
Summary
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net: skb: fix cross-cache free of KFENCE-allocated skb head SKB_SMALL_HEAD_CACHE_SIZE is intentionally set to a non-power-of-2 value (e.g. 704 on x86_64) to avoid collisions with generic kmalloc bucket sizes. This ensures that skb_kfree_head() can reliably use skb_end_offset to distinguish skb heads allocated from skb_small_head_cache vs. generic kmalloc caches. However, when KFENCE is enabled, kfence_ksize() returns the exact requested allocation size instead of the slab bucket size. If a caller (e.g. bpf_test_init) allocates skb head data via kzalloc() and the requested size happens to equal SKB_SMALL_HEAD_CACHE_SIZE, then slab_build_skb() -> ksize() returns that exact value. After subtracting skb_shared_info overhead, skb_end_offset ends up matching SKB_SMALL_HEAD_HEADROOM, causing skb_kfree_head() to incorrectly free the object to skb_small_head_cache instead of back to the original kmalloc cache, resulting in a slab cross-cache free: kmem_cache_free(skbuff_small_head): Wrong slab cache. Expected skbuff_small_head but got kmalloc-1k Fix this by always calling kfree(head) in skb_kfree_head(). This keeps the free path generic and avoids allocator-specific misclassification for KFENCE objects.
Impacted products
Vendor Product Version
Linux Linux Version: bf9f1baa279f0758dc2297080360c5a616843927
Version: bf9f1baa279f0758dc2297080360c5a616843927
Version: bf9f1baa279f0758dc2297080360c5a616843927
Version: bf9f1baa279f0758dc2297080360c5a616843927
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{
  "containers": {
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      "affected": [
        {
          "defaultStatus": "unaffected",
          "product": "Linux",
          "programFiles": [
            "net/core/skbuff.c"
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              "versionType": "semver"
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              "operator": "OR"
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      ],
      "descriptions": [
        {
          "lang": "en",
          "value": "In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:\n\nnet: skb: fix cross-cache free of KFENCE-allocated skb head\n\nSKB_SMALL_HEAD_CACHE_SIZE is intentionally set to a non-power-of-2\nvalue (e.g. 704 on x86_64) to avoid collisions with generic kmalloc\nbucket sizes. This ensures that skb_kfree_head() can reliably use\nskb_end_offset to distinguish skb heads allocated from\nskb_small_head_cache vs. generic kmalloc caches.\n\nHowever, when KFENCE is enabled, kfence_ksize() returns the exact\nrequested allocation size instead of the slab bucket size. If a caller\n(e.g. bpf_test_init) allocates skb head data via kzalloc() and the\nrequested size happens to equal SKB_SMALL_HEAD_CACHE_SIZE, then\nslab_build_skb() -\u003e ksize() returns that exact value. After subtracting\nskb_shared_info overhead, skb_end_offset ends up matching\nSKB_SMALL_HEAD_HEADROOM, causing skb_kfree_head() to incorrectly free\nthe object to skb_small_head_cache instead of back to the original\nkmalloc cache, resulting in a slab cross-cache free:\n\n  kmem_cache_free(skbuff_small_head): Wrong slab cache. Expected\n  skbuff_small_head but got kmalloc-1k\n\nFix this by always calling kfree(head) in skb_kfree_head(). This keeps\nthe free path generic and avoids allocator-specific misclassification\nfor KFENCE objects."
        }
      ],
      "providerMetadata": {
        "dateUpdated": "2026-04-20T09:43:03.194Z",
        "orgId": "416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67",
        "shortName": "Linux"
      },
      "references": [
        {
          "url": "https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/60313768a8edc7094435975587c00c2d7b834083"
        },
        {
          "url": "https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/2d64618ea846d8d033477311f805ca487d6a6696"
        },
        {
          "url": "https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/474e00b935db250cac320d10c1d3cf4e44b46721"
        },
        {
          "url": "https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/0f42e3f4fe2a58394e37241d02d9ca6ab7b7d516"
        }
      ],
      "title": "net: skb: fix cross-cache free of KFENCE-allocated skb head",
      "x_generator": {
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      }
    }
  },
  "cveMetadata": {
    "assignerOrgId": "416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67",
    "assignerShortName": "Linux",
    "cveId": "CVE-2026-31429",
    "datePublished": "2026-04-20T09:43:03.194Z",
    "dateReserved": "2026-03-09T15:48:24.089Z",
    "dateUpdated": "2026-04-20T09:43:03.194Z",
    "state": "PUBLISHED"
  },
  "dataType": "CVE_RECORD",
  "dataVersion": "5.2"
}


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