Medium [CVE-2026-64120] fix NULL pointer dereference in phy_reply_size

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net: ethtool: fix NULL pointer dereference in phy_reply_size In phy_prepare_data(), several strings such as 'name', 'drvname', 'upstream_sfp_name', and 'downstream_sfp_name' are allocated using kstrdup(). However, these allocations were not checked for failure.

If kstrdup() fails for 'name', it returns NULL while the function continues. This leads to a kernel NULL pointer dereference and panic later in phy_reply_size() when it unconditionally calls strlen() on the NULL pointer.

While other strings like 'upstream_sfp_name' might be checked before access in certain code paths, failing to handle these allocations consistently can lead to incomplete data reporting or hidden bugs.

Fix this by adding proper NULL checks for all kstrdup() calls in phy_prepare_data() and implement a centralized error handling path using goto labels to ensure all previously allocated resources are freed on failure. A flaw was found in the Linux kernel's `ethtool` network utility.

Insufficient error handling in the `phy_prepare_data()` function, specifically for memory allocation failures when handling network device names, can lead to a NULL pointer dereference. This vulnerability can cause a kernel panic in `phy_reply_size()` when processing network device information, resulting in a Denial of Service (DoS) for the system.