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Fencer Vulns
high 7.8

CVE-2026-68178 json

misc: nsm: pin the module while the device is open

published 2026-08-10 2 mo ago modified 2026-10-19 20 d ago also EUVD-2026-55279

cvss
7.8
version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.2%
EPSS 0.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 5%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

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

misc: nsm: pin the module while the device is open

misc_open() installs a misc driver's file operations with fops_get(), which pins file_operations::owner before replacing the file's f_op. The NSM misc device leaves nsm_dev_fops.owner unset, so opening /dev/nsm does not take a module reference on the nsm driver.

If the driver is built as a module, an open file descriptor can therefore survive rmmod of the module that provides its ioctl callbacks. A later ioctl through that descriptor can call into unloaded module text.

Set nsm_dev_fops.owner to THIS_MODULE so the misc core holds the module while any /dev/nsm file descriptor is open, matching the lifetime expectation for the installed file operations.

Patch / fix

  • Linux Linux 6.12.101, 6.18.42, 7.1.6, 7.2
  • linux Debian 13 6.12.101-1
  • linux Debian 14 7.1.6-1
  • linux-6.12 Debian 12 6.12.101-1~deb12u1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2026-68178

  • linux Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-147.147
  • linux Ubuntu 26.04 LTS 7.0.0-38.38
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1067.70
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 26.04 LTS 7.0.0-1014.14
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1071.79
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 26.04 LTS 7.0.0-1014.14
  • linux-gke Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1066.74
  • linux-gke Ubuntu 26.04 LTS 7.0.0-1008.9

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2026-68178

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-rt Linux Micro 6.2 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • kernel-64kb SLES 16.0, Linux Micro 6.2, SLES for SAP applications 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • kernel-source SLES 16.0, Linux Micro 6.2, SLES for SAP applications 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • kernel-default SLES 16.0, SLE High Availability Extension 16.0, Linux Micro 6.2 +1 more 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • kernel-default-base SLES 16.0, Linux Micro 6.2, SLES for SAP applications 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1.160000.2.23
  • kernel-syms SLES 16.0, Linux Micro Extras 6.2, SLES for SAP applications 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • kernel-azure SLES for SAP applications 16.0, SLES 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • kernel-obs-qa SLES for SAP applications 16.0, SLES 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2026:23887-1SUSE-SU-2026:23902-1SUSE-SU-2026:23897-1SUSE-SU-2026:23881-1

  • kernel-rt openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • dtb-aarch64 openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • kernel-64kb openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • kernel-syms openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • kernel-azure openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • kernel-obs-qa openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • kernel-source openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1
  • kernel-default openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.38.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2026:21910-1

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-2026-68178 updated cvss 5.5

kernel: misc: nsm: pin the module while the device is open

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux for NVIDIA 26 kernel 6.12.0-257.el10
    affected: no fix planned “Out of support scope”
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 perf, kernel, python-perf, kernel-kdump, kernel-firmware, kernel-bootwrapper, +2 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, python-perf, kernel-kdump, +9 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, kernel-core, kernel-tools, +30 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 rv, perf, rtla, kernel, bpftool, libperf, +84 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 kernel 6.12.0-257.el10 Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4 openshift/ose-rhel-coreos-8, openshift/ose-rhel-coreos-9
    +1 more products
    Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 5 openshift/ose-rhel-coreos-9
    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

CISA SSVC

Exploitation
none
Automatable
no
Technical impact
total
Assessed
23 d ago

Exploit prediction

0.16% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 5% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
CNA 3.1 7.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/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.