Bug 2502209 (CVE-2026-53395)

Summary: CVE-2026-53395 kernel: nfsd: fix dead ACL conflict guard in nfsd4_create
Product: [Other] Security Response Reporter: OSIDB Bzimport <bzimport>
Component: vulnerabilityAssignee: Product Security DevOps Team <prodsec-dev>
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Priority: medium    
Version: unspecifiedCC: rhel-process-autobot, watson-tool-maintainers
Target Milestone: ---Keywords: Security
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Hardware: All   
OS: Linux   
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A flaw was found in the Linux kernel's Network File System (NFS) daemon (nfsd). A remote attacker can exploit this vulnerability by sending specially crafted NFS CREATE requests that include conflicting Access Control List (ACL) attributes. This leads to a memory leak, where the system fails to release memory objects, causing unbounded memory exhaustion. Repeated exploitation can result in a Denial of Service (DoS), making the system unresponsive to legitimate requests.
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oVirt Team: --- RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host:
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Description OSIDB Bzimport 2026-07-19 13:01:58 UTC
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

nfsd: fix dead ACL conflict guard in nfsd4_create

nfsd4_create() steals create->cr_dpacl/cr_pacl into the local
nfsd_attrs via the designated initializer, then immediately sets the
source pointers to NULL. The subsequent conflict guard tests the
already-nilled source fields, making it permanently dead code:

    if (create->cr_acl) {
        if (create->cr_dpacl || create->cr_pacl)  /* always false */

When a client encodes both FATTR4_WORD0_ACL and
FATTR4_WORD2_POSIX_{DEFAULT,ACCESS}_ACL in the same CREATE fattr
bitmap, nfsd4_acl_to_attr() overwrites attrs.na_pacl/na_dpacl without
releasing the originals, leaking two posix_acl slab objects per
request. Repeated requests cause unbounded slab exhaustion.

Fix by checking attrs.na_dpacl/na_pacl (the stolen values) instead of
the nilled create->cr_dpacl/cr_pacl, matching the correct pattern
already used in nfsd4_setattr().