Race condition in Linux kernel - CVE-2026-99179
Published: October 29, 2026
Vulnerability identifier: #VU158407
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-2026-99179
CWE-ID: CWE-362
Exploitation vector: Local access
Exploit availability:
No public exploit available
Vulnerability details
The vulnerability allows a local user to cause a denial of service by triggering a kernel panic.
The vulnerability exists due to a race condition in the Linux kernel watch queue subsystem when publishing notification pool state concurrently with notification delivery. A local user can race ioctl(IOC_WATCH_QUEUE_SET_SIZE) on a notification pipe against keyctl(KEYCTL_SETPERM) on a watched key they own from another CPU to cause post_one_notification() to dereference a NULL notes pointer and panic the kernel.
Affected software
Linux kernel
Debian Linux
linux (Debian package)
Debian Linux
linux (Debian package)
How to mitigate CVE-2026-99179
Install security update from vendor's repository.
Linux kernel - update to 7.0 rc3
linux (Debian package) - update to 6.12.115-2
linux (Debian package) - update to 6.12.115-2