Vulnerability · Published Mar 26, 2026 · Assigned by redhat
CVE-2026-4897Polkit: polkit: denial of service via unbounded input processing through standard input
Medium 5.5
In plain English
A medium-severity resource allocation without limits in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 from Red Hat. There are no confirmed reports of exploitation so far. The chance it is exploited in the next 30 days is estimated at 0.2% (higher than 5% of all known vulnerabilities). Fixed versions are available - upgrade the affected package.
Official description
A flaw was found in polkit. A local user can exploit this by providing a specially crafted, excessively long input to the `polkit-agent-helper-1` setuid binary via standard input (stdin). This unbounded input can lead to an out-of-memory (OOM) condition, resulting in a Denial of Service (DoS) for the system.
Affected packages & fixed versions
| Ecosystem | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| AlmaLinux:10 | polkit | 125-4.el10_2.1 | ALSA-2026:59997 |
| AlmaLinux:10 | polkit-devel | 125-4.el10_2.1 | ALSA-2026:59997 |
| AlmaLinux:10 | polkit-docs | 125-4.el10_2.1 | ALSA-2026:59997 |
| AlmaLinux:10 | polkit-libs | 125-4.el10_2.1 | ALSA-2026:59997 |
| Debian:12 | policykit-1 | no fix listed | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-4897 |
| Debian:13 | policykit-1 | no fix listed | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-4897 |
| Debian:14 | policykit-1 | 127-3 | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-4897 |
| Rocky Linux:10 | polkit | 0:125-4.el10_2.1 | RLSA-2026:59997 |
| Ubuntu:22.04:LTS | policykit-1 | 0.105-33ubuntu0.1 | USN-8173-1 |
| Ubuntu:22.04:LTS | policykit-1 | 0.105-33ubuntu0.1 | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-4897 |
| Ubuntu:24.04:LTS | policykit-1 | 124-2ubuntu1.24.04.3 | USN-8173-1 |
| Ubuntu:24.04:LTS | policykit-1 | 124-2ubuntu1.24.04.3 | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-4897 |
| Ubuntu:25.10 | policykit-1 | 126-2ubuntu0.1 | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-4897 |
| Ubuntu:25.10 | policykit-1 | 126-2ubuntu0.1 | USN-8173-1 |
Affected products (as reported)
| Vendor | Product | Versions |
|---|---|---|
| Red Hat | Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 | see references |
| Red Hat | Red Hat Hardened Images | see references |
| Red Hat | Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 | see references |
| Red Hat | Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | see references |
| Red Hat | Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 | see references |
| Red Hat | Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 | see references |
| Red Hat | Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4 | see references |
| Red Hat | Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4 | see references |
Weakness: CWE-770 · Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
References
- RHSA-2026:59997 vendor-advisory, x_refsource_REDHAT
- RHSA-2026:66287 vendor-advisory, x_refsource_REDHAT
- https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-4897 vdb-entry, x_refsource_REDHAT
- RHBZ#2451739 issue-tracking, x_refsource_REDHAT