Public vulnerability disclosure

CVE-2026-43472

unshare: fix unshare_fs() handling

published

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: unshare: fix unshare_fs() handling There's an unpleasant corner case in unshare(2), when we have a CLONE_NEWNS in flags and current->fs hadn't been shared at all; in that case copy_mnt_ns() gets passed current->fs instead of a private copy, which causes interesting warts in proof of correctness] > I guess if private means fs->users == 1, the condition could still be true. Unfortunately, it's worse than just a convoluted proof of correctness. Consider the case when we have CLONE_NEWCGROUP in addition to CLONE_NEWNS (and current->fs->users == 1). We pass current->fs to copy_mnt_ns(), all right. Suppose it succeeds and flips current->fs->{pwd,root} to corresponding locations in the new namespace. Now we proceed to copy_cgroup_ns(), which fails (e.g. with -ENOMEM). We call put_mnt_ns() on the namespace created by copy_mnt_ns(), it's destroyed and its mount tree is dissolved, but... current->fs->root and current->fs->pwd are both left pointing to now detached mounts. They are pinning those, so it's not a UAF, but it leaves the calling process with unshare(2) failing with -ENOMEM _and_ leaving it with pwd and root on detached isolated mounts. The last part is clearly a bug. There is other fun related to that mess (races with pivot_root(), including the one between pivot_root() and fork(), of all things), but this one is easy to isolate and fix - treat CLONE_NEWNS as "allocate a new fs_struct even if it hadn't been shared in the first place". Sure, we could go for something like "if both CLONE_NEWNS *and* one of the things that might end up failing after copy_mnt_ns() call in create_new_namespaces() are set, force allocation of new fs_struct", but let's keep it simple - the cost of copy_fs_struct() is trivial. Another benefit is that copy_mnt_ns() with CLONE_NEWNS *always* gets a freshly allocated fs_struct, yet to be attached to anything. That seriously simplifies the analysis... FWIW, that bug had been there since the introduction of unshare(2) ;-/

Technical severityUnscoredNo score in collected sources
Published2026-05-08Source updated 2026-11-06
Collected2026-11-062 attributed sources

Fixes and workarounds

No remediation reported in collected sources.

Missing remediation information is not evidence that no patch exists.

Affected products and versions

Affected products, source version ranges and reporting authorities
ProductVersionsAuthority
Linux
Linux
≥ 741a295130606143edbf9fc740f633dbc1e6225f; < 845bf3c6963a52096d0d3866e4a92db77a0c03d8 (affected, git)
≥ 741a295130606143edbf9fc740f633dbc1e6225f; < d3ffc8f13034af895531a02c30b1fe3a34b46432 (affected, git)
≥ 741a295130606143edbf9fc740f633dbc1e6225f; < d0d99f60538ddb4a62ccaac2168d8f448965f083 (affected, git)
≥ 741a295130606143edbf9fc740f633dbc1e6225f; < d7963d6997fea86a6def242ac36198b86655f912 (affected, git)
≥ 741a295130606143edbf9fc740f633dbc1e6225f; < aa9ebc084505fb26dd90f4d7a249045aad152043 (affected, git)
≥ 741a295130606143edbf9fc740f633dbc1e6225f; < af8f4be3b68ac8caa41c8e5ead0eeaf5e85e42d0 (affected, git)
≥ 741a295130606143edbf9fc740f633dbc1e6225f; < 42e21e74061b0ebbd859839f81acf10efad02a27 (affected, git)
≥ 741a295130606143edbf9fc740f633dbc1e6225f; < 6c4b2243cb6c0755159bd567130d5e12e7b10d9f (affected, git)
Other versions: unaffected
CNA: Linux
Linux
Linux
2.6.16 (affected)
≥ 0; < 2.6.16 (unaffected, semver)
≥ 5.10.253; ≤ 5.10.* (unaffected, semver)
≥ 5.15.203; ≤ 5.15.* (unaffected, semver)
≥ 6.1.167; ≤ 6.1.* (unaffected, semver)
≥ 6.6.130; ≤ 6.6.* (unaffected, semver)
≥ 6.12.78; ≤ 6.12.* (unaffected, semver)
≥ 6.18.19; ≤ 6.18.* (unaffected, semver)
≥ 6.19.9; ≤ 6.19.* (unaffected, semver)
≥ 7.0; ≤ * (unaffected, original_commit_for_fix)
Other versions: affected
CNA: Linux

Version ranges are source assertions. Check the vendor advisory and your installed configuration before determining exposure.

CVSS assessments

No CVSS assessment reported. An unscored record is not a low-severity determination.

Exploit evidence

No exploit evidence in collected sources. This is not proof of no exploitation.

References

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