CVE-2026-98625
Description
A flaw was found in the Linux kernel's netfilter subsystem. A timing conflict, or race condition, in the flowtable offload component allows flow data to be prematurely released from memory while still being processed by a cleanup worker. A local attacker could exploit this use-after-free vulnerability during network connection teardown to cause a Denial of Service (DoS) through a system crash or potentially escalate privileges.
Statement
Red Hat rates this vulnerability as Moderate severity because exploitation requires local system access and depends on a precise race condition during flow cleanup on systems utilizing hardware flowtable offload, limiting the attack window. In typical Red Hat Enterprise Linux environments, hardware-accelerated flowtable offload is not enabled by default and requires administrative configuration on supported network interfaces. Although an unprivileged local user initiating connection teardown might trigger the condition when this feature is active, successful exploitation primarily results in a denial of service via kernel crash.
Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) Score Details
Info alert:Important note
CVSS scores for open source components depend on vendor-specific factors (e.g. version or build chain). Therefore, Red Hat's score and impact rating can be different from NVD and other vendors. Red Hat remains the authoritative CVE Naming Authority (CNA) source for its products and services (see Red Hat classifications).
The following CVSS metrics and score provided are preliminary and subject to review.
CVSS v3 Score Breakdown
| Red Hat | NVD | cve.org | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Base Score | 4.7 | N/A | N/A |
| Attack Vector | Local | N/A | N/A |
| Attack Complexity | High | N/A | N/A |
| Privileges Required | Low | N/A | N/A |
| User Interaction | None | N/A | N/A |
| Scope | Unchanged | N/A | N/A |
| Confidentiality | None | N/A | N/A |
| Integrity Impact | None | N/A | N/A |
| Availability Impact | High | N/A | N/A |
Vector
Red Hat: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
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