Medium [CVE-2026-74342] link kn to its parent before the LSM init hook
This medium-severity Red Hat Linux advisory covers CVE-2026-74342 affecting Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.
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Summary
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: kernfs: link kn to its parent before the LSM init hook After commit 12e9e3cd03b5 ("simpe_xattr: use per-sb cache"), kernfs_xattr_set() and kernfs_xattr_get() compute the cache via kernfs_root(kn) before any other check. kernfs_root(kn) walks kn->__parent first and falls back to kn->dir.root, both of which are NULL on a freshly kmem_cache_zalloc()'d kn. kn->__parent was being set in kernfs_new_node() after __kernfs_new_node() returned, and kn->dir.root is set even later by kernfs_create_dir_ns() / kernfs_create_empty_dir().
The LSM kernfs_init_security hook is invoked from inside __kernfs_new_node(), before either field has been initialized. selinux_kernfs_init_security() ends with kernfs_xattr_set(kn, XATTR_NAME_SELINUX,...). kernfs_root(kn) then returns NULL, and &((struct kernfs_root *)NULL)->xa_cache evaluates to offsetof(struct kernfs_root, xa_cache) which faults: BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference, address: 00000000000000e0 RIP: 0010:simple_xattr_set+0x27/0x8b0 Call Trace: kernfs_xattr_set+0x63/0xb0 selinux_kernfs_init_security+0x13b/0x270 security_kernfs_init_security+0x36/0xc0 __kernfs_new_node+0x182/0x290 kernfs_new_node+0x80/0xc0 kernfs_create_dir_ns+0x2b/0xa0 cgroup_create+0x116/0x380 cgroup_mkdir+0x7c/0x1a0 Reproduces deterministically at PID 1 (systemd) on an SELinux-enabled distro.
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 1 hour 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 1 hour ago·verify at source
Mitigation
The source record does not include mitigation steps. That is not a statement that no fix exists — read the vendor advisory below for the authoritative guidance.
Official advisory · medium-confidence parse· fetched 1 hour ago·verify at source
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