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Fencer Vulns
medium 5.5

CVE-2026-43046 json

btrfs: reject root items with drop_progress and zero drop_level

published 2026-05-01 6 mo ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2026-26645

cvss
5.5
version 3.1, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.1%
EPSS 0.1% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 1%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

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

btrfs: reject root items with drop_progress and zero drop_level

[BUG] When recovering relocation at mount time, merge_reloc_root() and btrfs_drop_snapshot() both use BUG_ON(level == 0) to guard against an impossible state: a non-zero drop_progress combined with a zero drop_level in a root_item, which can be triggered:

------------[ cut here ]------------ kernel BUG at fs/btrfs/relocation.c:1545! Oops: invalid opcode: 0000 [#1] SMP KASAN NOPTI CPU: 1 UID: 0 PID: 283 ... Tainted: 6.18.0+ #16 PREEMPT(voluntary) Tainted: [O]=OOT_MODULE, [E]=UNSIGNED_MODULE Hardware name: QEMU Ubuntu 24.04 PC v2, BIOS 1.16.3-debian-1.16.3-2 RIP: 0010:merge_reloc_root+0x1266/0x1650 fs/btrfs/relocation.c:1545 Code: ffff0000 00004589 d7e9acfa ffffe8a1 79bafebe 02000000 Call Trace: merge_reloc_roots+0x295/0x890 fs/btrfs/relocation.c:1861 btrfs_recover_relocation+0xd6e/0x11d0 fs/btrfs/relocation.c:4195 btrfs_start_pre_rw_mount+0xa4d/0x1810 fs/btrfs/disk-io.c:3130 open_ctree+0x5824/0x5fe0 fs/btrfs/disk-io.c:3640 btrfs_fill_super fs/btrfs/super.c:987 [inline] btrfs_get_tree_super fs/btrfs/super.c:1951 [inline] btrfs_get_tree_subvol fs/btrfs/super.c:2094 [inline] btrfs_get_tree+0x111c/0x2190 fs/btrfs/super.c:2128 vfs_get_tree+0x9a/0x370 fs/super.c:1758 fc_mount fs/namespace.c:1199 [inline] do_new_mount_fc fs/namespace.c:3642 [inline] do_new_mount fs/namespace.c:3718 [inline] path_mount+0x5b8/0x1ea0 fs/namespace.c:4028 do_mount fs/namespace.c:4041 [inline] __do_sys_mount fs/namespace.c:4229 [inline] __se_sys_mount fs/namespace.c:4206 [inline] __x64_sys_mount+0x282/0x320 fs/namespace.c:4206 ... RIP: 0033:0x7f969c9a8fde Code: 0f1f4000 48c7c2b0 fffffff7 d8648902 b8ffffff ffc3660f ---[ end trace 0000000000000000 ]---

The bug is reproducible on 7.0.0-rc2-next-20260310 with our dynamic metadata fuzzing tool that corrupts btrfs metadata at runtime.

[CAUSE] A non-zero drop_progress.objectid means an interrupted btrfs_drop_snapshot() left a resume point on disk, and in that case drop_level must be greater than 0 because the checkpoint is only saved at internal node levels.

Although this invariant is enforced when the kernel writes the root item, it is not validated when the root item is read back from disk. That allows on-disk corruption to provide an invalid state with drop_progress.objectid != 0 and drop_level == 0.

When relocation recovery later processes such a root item, merge_reloc_root() reads drop_level and hits BUG_ON(level == 0). The same invalid metadata can also trigger the corresponding BUG_ON() in btrfs_drop_snapshot().

[FIX] Fix this by validating the root_item invariant in tree-checker when reading root items from disk: if drop_progress.objectid is non-zero, drop_level must also be non-zero. Reject such malformed metadata with -EUCLEAN before it reaches merge_reloc_root() or btrfs_drop_snapshot() and triggers the BUG_ON.

After the fix, the same corruption is correctly rejected by tree-checker and the BUG_ON is no longer triggered.

Patch / fix

  • Linux Linux 5.15.203, 6.1.168, 6.6.134, 6.12.81, 6.18.22, 6.19.12, 7.0
  • linux Debian 12 6.1.170-1
  • linux Debian 13 6.12.85-1
  • linux Debian 14 6.19.12-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2026-43046

  • linux Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-186.196
  • linux Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-136.136
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1112.119
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1061.64
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1112.122
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1064.72
  • linux-gke Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1108.114
  • linux-gke Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1059.67

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2026-43046

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 6.4.0-150600.23.130.1
  • kernel-rt Real Time Module 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.7.72.1
  • kernel-syms-rt Real Time Module 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.7.72.1
  • kernel-source-rt Real Time Module 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.7.72.1
  • kernel-64kb SLE Module for Basesystem 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.53.78.1
  • kernel-syms SLE Module for Development Tools 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.53.78.1
  • kernel-azure SLE Module for Public Cloud 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.53.78.1
  • kernel-source SLE Module for Development Tools 15 SP7, SLE Module for Basesystem 15 SP7 6.4.0-150700.53.78.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2026:3602-1SUSE-SU-2026:3810-1SUSE-SU-2026:3790-1SUSE-SU-2026:23244-1SUSE-SU-2026:23241-1SUSE-SU-2026:23194-1

  • kernel-rt openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.37.1
  • dtb-aarch64 openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.37.1
  • kernel-64kb openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.37.1
  • kernel-syms openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.37.1
  • kernel-azure openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.37.1
  • kernel-obs-qa openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.37.1
  • kernel-source openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.37.1
  • kernel-default openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.37.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2026:21555-1

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-2026-43046 updated cvss 5.5

kernel: btrfs: reject root items with drop_progress and zero drop_level

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 kernel
    affected: workaround, no fix available “To mitigate this issue, prevent the btrfs module from being loaded. See https://access.redhat.com/solutions/41278 for instructions.”
  • 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
    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

0.11% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 1% 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
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.