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Fencer Vulns
medium 5.5

CVE-2026-23409 json

apparmor: fix differential encoding verification

published 2026-04-01 7 mo ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2026-17839

cvss
5.5
version 3.1, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.2%
EPSS 0.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 8%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

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

apparmor: fix differential encoding verification

Differential encoding allows loops to be created if it is abused. To prevent this the unpack should verify that a diff-encode chain terminates.

Unfortunately the differential encode verification had two bugs.

1. it conflated states that had gone through check and already been marked, with states that were currently being checked and marked. This means that loops in the current chain being verified are treated as a chain that has already been verified.

2. the order bailout on already checked states compared current chain check iterators j,k instead of using the outer loop iterator i. Meaning a step backwards in states in the current chain verification was being mistaken for moving to an already verified state.

Move to a double mark scheme where already verified states get a different mark, than the current chain being kept. This enables us to also drop the backwards verification check that was the cause of the second error as any already verified state is already marked.

Patch / fix

  • Linux Linux 5.10.253, 5.15.203, 6.1.169, 6.6.130, 6.12.77, 6.18.18, 6.19.8, 7.0
  • linux Debian 12 6.1.164-1
  • linux Debian 13 6.12.74-2
  • linux Debian 14 6.19.6-2

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2026-23409

  • linux Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-173.183
  • linux Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-106.106
  • linux Ubuntu 25.10 6.17.0-19.19
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1103.110
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1050.53
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 25.10 6.17.0-1009.9
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1103.112
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1052.55

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2026-23409

Ubuntu security data © Canonical Ltd., from https://github.com/canonical/ubuntu-security-notices via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

  • kernel-default SLES for SAP 15 SP6, SLES 15 SP6-LTSS, SLE Live Patching 15 SP6 +1 more 6.4.0-150600.23.112.1
  • kernel-64kb SLE Module for Basesystem 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.53.55.1
  • kernel-syms SLE Module for Development Tools 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.53.55.1
  • kernel-azure SLE Module for Public Cloud 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.53.55.1
  • kernel-source SLE Module for Development Tools 15 SP7, SLE Module for Basesystem 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.53.55.1
  • kernel-default SLE Workstation Extension 15 SP7, SLE Module for Legacy 15 SP7, SLE Module for Basesystem 15 SP7 +2 more 6.4.0-150700.53.55.1
  • kernel-zfcpdump SLE Module for Basesystem 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.53.55.1
  • kernel-obs-build SLE Module for Development Tools 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.53.55.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2026:2195-1SUSE-SU-2026:2238-1SUSE-SU-2026:21834-1

  • kernel Azure Linux 3.0 6.6.130.1-1

azure linux advisories AZL-82031

Azure Linux vulnerability data, Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation, from https://github.com/microsoft/AzureLinuxVulnerabilityData via OSV, under the MIT licence; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. MIT

Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2026-23409 updated

kernel: apparmor: fix differential encoding verification

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 perf, kernel, python-perf, kernel-kdump, kernel-firmware, kernel-bootwrapper, +1 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, python-perf, kernel-kdump, +8 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, kernel-core, kernel-tools, +29 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 rv, perf, rtla, kernel, bpftool, libperf, +83 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 kernel
    not affected: vulnerable code not present

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

Exploit prediction

0.18% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 8% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.1 5.5 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

Affected products

  • Linux Linux

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-835 Loop with Unreachable Exit Condition
Technology feeds

References

Sources

Fencer Vulns keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.