Medium [CVE-2026-68214] fix use-after-free in rtl2832_remove
This medium-severity Red Hat Linux advisory covers CVE-2026-68214 affecting Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8, Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4, Red Hat package: kernel-rt.
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Summary
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: media: rtl2832: fix use-after-free in rtl2832_remove() cancel_delayed_work_sync() is called before i2c_mux_del_adapters() in rtl2832_remove().
While the cancel waits for any running instance of i2c_gate_work to finish, it does not prevent the timer from being rescheduled by a concurrent thread. During probe, the r820t_attach() call attempts I2C transfers through the mux adapter.
These transfers go through i2c_mux_master_xfer(), which calls rtl2832_deselect() after the transfer completes, rescheduling i2c_gate_work via schedule_delayed_work(). If this transfer is still in flight when rtl2832_remove() runs, rtl2832_deselect() can reschedule i2c_gate_work after it has been cancelled, causing a use-after-free when kfree(dev) is called.
Once the mux adapter is unregistered, no new I2C transfers can go through it, so rtl2832_deselect() can no longer reschedule i2c_gate_work. The subsequent cancel_delayed_work_sync() is then guaranteed to be final.
A timing issue during the removal of the `rtl2832` device can lead to a use-after-free vulnerability. This occurs when the system attempts to access memory that has already been released, which can cause system instability or a denial of service (DoS).
A local attacker could potentially exploit this flaw.
Affected versions
No affected-version range was extracted from the source record. The vendor advisory is authoritative — check it before change work.
Official advisory · high-confidence parse· fetched 2 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 · high-confidence parse· fetched 2 days ago·verify at source
Mitigation checklist
- To mitigate this issue, prevent the rtl2832 module from loading. See https://access.redhat.com/solutions/41278 for instructions.
Official advisory · high-confidence parse· fetched 2 days ago·verify at source
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