Use-after-free in Linux kernel - CVE-2026-98496

Vulnerability identifier: #VU156796

CSH Severity: Low

CVSS v4: 5.6 [CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:P/PR:H/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N]

CVE-ID: CVE-2026-98496

CWE-ID: CWE-416

Exploitation vector: Local access

Exploit availability: No public exploit available

The vulnerability allows a local privileged user to potentially cause a denial of service through a kernel use-after-free.

The vulnerability exists due to use-after-free in the Airoha NPU driver's watchdog work handling when driver teardown cancels work before releasing the watchdog interrupt. A local privileged user can exploit a timing window in which the interrupt handler queues work after cancellation to potentially cause a kernel crash when that work accesses freed memory.

Linux kernel
Ubuntu
linux (Ubuntu package)
linux-aws (Ubuntu package)
linux-gcp (Ubuntu package)
linux-oracle (Ubuntu package)
linux-ibm (Ubuntu package)
linux-hwe-7.0 (Ubuntu package)
linux-oem-7.0 (Ubuntu package)

Install security update from vendor's repository.

Linux kernel - update to 7.0 rc3
linux (Ubuntu package) - update to 7.0.0-42.42
linux-aws (Ubuntu package) - update to 7.0.0-1016.17
linux-gcp (Ubuntu package) - update to 7.0.0-1016.18
linux-oracle (Ubuntu package) - update to 7.0.0-1015.16
linux-ibm (Ubuntu package) - update to 7.0.0-1017.17
linux-hwe-7.0 (Ubuntu package) - update to 7.0.0-42.42~24.04.1
linux-oem-7.0 (Ubuntu package) - update to 7.0.0-1017.17

• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/4bdee8060d1e4581624e68fbd369b1afb14df4bc
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/aca91d8fa0ecbc990ebf9a688c684dda78a43c00
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/da9d42531f3a6dfea2e9c775b62a46185dbf280a

• Use-after-free in Linux kernel ethernet airoha driver
• Ubuntu update for linux-oem-7.0
• Ubuntu update for linux, linux-aws, linux-gcp and more