CVE-2026-23060
Description
A flaw was found in the Linux kernel's authencesn authenticated encryption with associated data implementation. A remote attacker can exploit this vulnerability by providing a specially crafted Associated Additional Data with a length shorter than the expected minimum. This can lead to a NULL pointer dereference, causing a kernel panic and resulting in a Denial of Service.
Statement
A denial of service can occur in the authencesn AEAD implementation when the associated data length is shorter than the minimum ESP ESN AAD size. With assoclen less than 8 the decrypt path can advance beyond the end of the destination scatterlist and later hit a NULL pointer dereference in scatterwalk_map_and_copy which can panic the kernel. For the CVSS the PR is N in the paranoid rating because an attacker does not need local privileges if they can reach a kernel user of authencesn with attacker controlled AAD. This is plausibly network reachable in deployments that use IPsec ESP with ESN or other kernel paths that feed ESP like AAD into authencesn. Impact is denial of service via kernel crash. There is no indication of information disclosure or privilege escalation from this fix.
Mitigation
To mitigate this issue, prevent module authenc from being loaded. Please see https://access.redhat.com/solutions/41278 for how to blacklist a kernel module to prevent it from loading automatically.
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).
CVSS v3 Score Breakdown
| Red Hat | NVD | cve.org | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Base Score | 6.5 | 5.5 | N/A |
| Attack Vector | Adjacent Network | Local | N/A |
| Attack Complexity | Low | Low | N/A |
| Privileges Required | None | Low | N/A |
| User Interaction | None | None | N/A |
| Scope | Unchanged | Unchanged | N/A |
| Confidentiality | None | None | N/A |
| Integrity Impact | None | None | N/A |
| Availability Impact | High | High | N/A |
Vector
Red Hat: CVSS:3.1/AV:A/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
NVD: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
Understanding the Weakness (CWE)
Other,Integrity,Availability
Technical Impact: Varies by Context; DoS: Resource Consumption (CPU); Modify Memory; Read Memory
When the quantity is not properly validated, then attackers can specify malicious quantities to cause excessive resource allocation, trigger unexpected failures, enable buffer overflows, etc.
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