CVE Watchtower

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CVE-2026-98441NVD

Vulnerability Summary

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

net/sched: act_ct: avoid modifying shared unconfirmed ct entry

In a case where skb with an unconfirmed ct entry gets cloned, we may
end up processing both again but with different sets of extensions.

The series of events:

1. The first clone wants to commit and runs the helpers wiring up
the extension pointer into the expectation list.
2. Then it looses the confirmation keeping the entry unconfirmed.
3. Second clone now wants to commit labels or run NAT and adds the
new extension for that breaking the pointer in the expectation
list causing UAF on the destruction path later.

While this is possible to trigger, there should be no practical
network pipeline where we need to process both clones without
modifications in the same zone. So, let's just reset the entry in
case for some reason we got an skb with a shared one. This doesn't
affect any known use cases, but avoids any potential problems with
sharing and modification of the unconfirmed ct entry.

Unlike openvswitch module, act_ct allows for NAT without commit.
Changing that would be a uAPI break. So, act_ct needs to reset on NAT
regardless of the commit flag to avoid reallocation of the extension
space. This, however, doesn't really change the picture for sensible
networking cases as there should be no need to run the same packet
twice (before and after the clone) through conntrack without packet
header or zone changes and without commit.

The fixes tag points to the introduction of helpers, since that's the
main UAF trigger for the sharing.
Severity Level
HIGH(7.8)
Published Date
Oct 18, 2026
Last Modified
Oct 24, 2026
Exploitation Status
No confirmed exploitation yet
EPSS Score (30-Day)
0.13%Probability
Root Weakness (CWE)
N/A
CVSS v3.1 Base Metrics — Score 7.8 (HIGH)
Attack VectorLocal
Attack ComplexityLow
Privileges RequiredLow
User InteractionNone
ScopeUnchanged
ConfidentialityHigh
IntegrityHigh
AvailabilityHigh

Affected & Patched Versions

Affected Versions
Not provided by NVD for this CVE.
Patched Versions
Not provided by NVD for this CVE.
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🚨All New CVEs — Be the first to know.
📈EPSS Spike Alerts — Catch rising risk before it peaks.
🎯Custom EPSS/CVSS — Filter noise, focus on risk.
🛡️Exploit Intel — A 2nd confirmed-exploit signal beyond KEV.
🐙GitHub Issues — Auto-tracked, no duplicates.
📬Weekly Digest — One clean summary, not inbox spam.
🏷️Watchlist Groups — Tag alerts by team (Infra/AppSec/SOC).
💬Webhooks — Slack & Teams integration.
🔀Smart Routing — Critical alerts to one channel, rest to another.
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