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Advisory severityMedium6.4Red Hat Linux

Medium [CVE-2026-53081] Enforce regsafe base id consistency for BPF_ADD_CONST scalars

This medium-severity Red Hat Linux advisory covers CVE-2026-53081 affecting Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9, Red Hat package: kernel-rt.

Aggregated and source-linked by VulniPulse. Data sources, validation and limitations.

CVE-2026-53081 Source published Source updated

VulniPulse record published Record updated

CVE-2026-53081
Affected products & platforms
Red Hat LinuxLinux Kernel
Open source advisory

Summary

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: bpf: Enforce regsafe base id consistency for BPF_ADD_CONST scalars When regsafe() compares two scalar registers that both carry BPF_ADD_CONST, check_scalar_ids() maps their full compound id (aka base | BPF_ADD_CONST flag) as one idmap entry.

However, it never verifies that the underlying base ids, that is, with the flag stripped are consistent with existing idmap mappings. This allows construction of two verifier states where the old state has R3 = R2 + 10 (both sharing base id A) while the current state has R3 = R4 + 10 (base id C, unrelated to R2).

The idmap creates two independent entries: A->B (for R2) and A|flag->C|flag (for R3), without catching that A->C conflicts with A->B. State pruning then incorrectly succeeds.

Fix this by additionally verifying base ID mapping consistency whenever BPF_ADD_CONST is set: after mapping the compound ids, also invoke check_ids() on the base IDs (flag bits stripped). This ensures that if A was already mapped to B from comparing the source register, any ADD_CONST derivative must also derive from B, not an unrelated C.

A flaw was found in the Linux kernel's Berkeley Packet Filter (BPF) verifier. This vulnerability occurs due to inconsistent base ID mapping when the `regsafe()` function compares scalar registers with `BPF_ADD_CONST` values.

Is CVE-2026-53081 exploited?

No exploitation is reported in the sources VulniPulse tracks: CVE-2026-53081 is not in the CISA KEV catalog (checked ) and this advisory does not report exploitation. That is not proof the vulnerability cannot be exploited.

How do I fix CVE-2026-53081?

The advisory VulniPulse tracks names no fixed release. Follow Red Hat's guidance for workarounds and updates.

Confirm against the vendor advisory before you patch.

Affected versions

No affected-version range was extracted from the source record. The vendor advisory is authoritative. Check it before change work.

Official advisory · medium-confidence parse· fetched 14 days ago·verify at source

Fixed versions

No fixed release is recorded yet. That does not prove no patch exists. Confirm against the vendor advisory.

Official advisory · medium-confidence parse· fetched 14 days ago·verify at source

Mitigation

The source record does not include mitigation steps. That does not mean no fix exists. Read the vendor advisory below for the authoritative guidance.

Official advisory · medium-confidence parse· fetched 14 days ago·verify at source

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