NULL pointer dereference in Linux kernel - CVE-2026-43401
Published: May 8, 2026
Vulnerability identifier: #VU130784
CSH Severity: Low
CVSS v4: 6.8 [CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N]
CVE-ID: CVE-2026-43401
CWE-ID: CWE-476
Exploitation vector: Local access
Exploit availability:
No public exploit available
Vulnerability details
The vulnerability allows a local user to cause a denial of service.
The vulnerability exists due to a NULL pointer dereference in update_cpu_qos_request() when handling QoS request updates. A local user can trigger the vulnerable code path to cause a denial of service.
The issue occurs on systems booted with the "nosmt" parameter, where SMT sibling threads may have NULL CPU data entries.
Affected software
Linux kernel
How to mitigate CVE-2026-43401
Install security update from vendor's repository.
Linux kernel - update to 7.0 rc3