Vulnerability · Published Aug 15, 2026 · Assigned by Linux

CVE-2026-72368cachefiles: Fix double unlock in nomem_d_alloc error path

High 7.8

In plain English

A high-severity security flaw in Linux from Linux. 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 6% of all known vulnerabilities). Fixed versions are available - upgrade the affected package.

Severity (CVSS 3.1)7.8High
Exploit odds (30 days)0.2%top 94.2% of all CVEs
Exploited in the wildNo reportsnot in CISA KEV
Attack toolingNoneno public tooling known

Official description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: cachefiles: Fix double unlock in nomem_d_alloc error path When start_creating() fails and returns -ENOMEM, it has already released the parent directory lock in __start_dirop(): static struct dentry *__start_dirop(...) { ... inode_lock_nested(dir, I_MUTEX_PARENT); dentry = lookup_one_qstr_excl(name, parent, lookup_flags); if (IS_ERR(dentry)) inode_unlock(dir); <-- Lock released on error return dentry; } However, the nomem_d_alloc error path in cachefiles_get_directory() unconditionally calls inode_unlock(d_inode(dir)) again, causing a double unlock that corrupts the rwsem state. This is a leftover from commit 7ab96df840e60 which replaced manual locking with start_creating() but failed to update the nomem_d_alloc path (while correctly updating mkdir_error and lookup_error paths).

Affected packages & fixed versions

EcosystemPackageFixed inAdvisory
Debian:14linux7.1.5-1DEBIAN-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux7.0.0-38.38UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-allwinner-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-aws7.0.0-1014.14UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-aws-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-aws-6.14no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-aws-6.17no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-aws-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-aws-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-aws-7.07.0.0-1014.14~24.04.1UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-azure7.0.0-1017.17UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-azure-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-azure-6.11no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-azure-6.14no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-azure-6.17no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-azure-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-azure-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-azure-7.07.0.0-1017.17~24.04.1UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-azure-fde7.0.0-1016.16UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-azure-fde-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-azure-fde-6.14no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-azure-fde-6.17no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-azure-fde-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-azure-fde-7.07.0.0-1016.16~24.04.1UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-azure-nvidia-6.14no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-gcp7.0.0-1014.14UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-gcp-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-gcp-6.11no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-gcp-6.14no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-gcp-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-gcp-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-gcp-7.07.0.0-1014.14~24.04.1UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-gke7.0.0-1008.9UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-hwe-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-hwe-6.11no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-hwe-6.14no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-hwe-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-hwe-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-hwe-7.07.0.0-38.38~24.04.4UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-ibm7.0.0-1015.15UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-intel-iot-realtimeno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-lowlatency-hwe-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-lowlatency-hwe-6.11no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-lowlatency-hwe-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-lowlatency-hwe-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-nvidiano fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-nvidia-6.11no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-nvidia-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-nvidia-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-nvidia-7.07.0.0-1024.25~24.04.1UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-nvidia-bos7.0.0-2022.23UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-oem-5.17no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-oem-6.0no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-oem-6.1no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-oem-6.11no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-oem-6.14no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-oem-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-oem-6.8no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-oem-7.07.0.0-1015.15UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-oracle7.0.0-1013.13UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-oracle-6.14no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-oracle-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-oracle-7.07.0.0-1013.13~24.04.1UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-raspino fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-raspi-realtimeno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-realtimeno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-realtimeno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-realtime7.0.0-38.38.1UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-riscvno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-riscvno fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:26.04:LTSlinux-riscv7.0.0-38.38.1UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-riscv-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-riscv-6.14no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-riscv-6.17no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-riscv-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:24.04:LTSlinux-riscv-7.07.0.0-38.38.1~24.04.1UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-starfive-5.19no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-starfive-6.2no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368
Ubuntu:22.04:LTSlinux-starfive-6.5no fix listedUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72368

Affected products (as reported)

VendorProductVersions
Linux Linux 7ab96df840e60eb933abfe65fc5fe44e72f16dc0 – before 26757dac15175f2a42e3537f1ba86e62456d48f17ab96df840e60eb933abfe65fc5fe44e72f16dc0 – before 8c256fba2b46020004201c500b2a1fbc707a33ef
Linux Linux 6.19

References