Bug 2516521 (CVE-2026-72135)

Summary: CVE-2026-72135 kernel: tpm: Make the TPM character devices non-seekable
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 Trusted Platform Module (TPM) character devices. These devices, intended for sequential command processing, incorrectly allow positional input/output (I/O) operations. A local attacker can exploit this by using a large offset in a positional read operation, leading to an out-of-bounds read from the heap. This could result in the disclosure of sensitive information or, through an out-of-bounds write, cause data corruption or a system crash.
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Description OSIDB Bzimport 2026-08-15 06:16:49 UTC
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

tpm: Make the TPM character devices non-seekable

The TPM character devices expose a sequential command/response
interface, but their open handlers leave FMODE_PREAD and FMODE_PWRITE
enabled.

After a command leaves a response pending, pread(fd, buf, 16, 0x1400)
passes 0x1400 as *off to tpm_common_read(). The transfer length is
bounded by response_length, but the offset is used unchecked when
forming data_buffer + *off. A sufficiently large offset therefore causes
an out-of-bounds heap read through copy_to_user() and, if the copy
succeeds, an out-of-bounds zero-write through the following memset().

Positional I/O does not provide coherent semantics for this interface.
An arbitrary pread offset cannot represent how much of a response has
been consumed sequentially. The write callback always stores a command
at the start of data_buffer, while pwrite() does not update file->f_pos
and can leave the sequential read cursor stale.

Call nonseekable_open() from both open handlers. This removes
FMODE_PREAD and FMODE_PWRITE, causing positional reads and writes to
fail with -ESPIPE before reaching the TPM callbacks, and explicitly
marks the files non-seekable. Normal read() and write() continue to use
the existing sequential f_pos cursor, leaving the response state machine
unchanged.

Tested on Linux 6.12 with KASAN and a swtpm TPM2 device:

 - sequential partial reads returned the complete response
 - pread() and preadv() with offset 0x1400 returned -ESPIPE
 - pwrite() and pwritev() with offset zero returned -ESPIPE
 - the pending response remained intact after the rejected operations
 - a subsequent normal command/response cycle completed normally
 - no KASAN report was produced.