Bug 2536417 (CVE-2026-90139)

Summary: CVE-2026-90139 kernel: fuse: check for NULL root inode in fuse_fill_super_submount
Product: [Other] Security Response Reporter: OSIDB Bzimport <bzimport>
Component: vulnerabilityAssignee: Product Security DevOps Team <prodsec-dev>
Status: NEW --- QA Contact:
Severity: low Docs Contact:
Priority: low    
Version: unspecifiedCC: akhatavk, aos-team-art-private, asdas, dpaolell, jdelft, jupierce, lgarciaa, mbiarnes, ppalepu, ppostler, prdhamdh, rhel-process-autobot, sghai, sidsharm, suppawar, vlaad, watson-tool-maintainers
Target Milestone: ---Keywords: Security
Target Release: ---   
Hardware: All   
OS: Linux   
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Fixed In Version: Doc Type: ---
Doc Text:
A flaw was found in the Linux kernel's Filesystem in Userspace (FUSE) subsystem. When the `fuse_iget()` function fails to allocate an inode, such as under memory pressure, the subsequent `fuse_fill_super_submount()` function does not properly handle the returned null value. This oversight can lead to a null pointer dereference, causing the system to crash and resulting in a denial of service.
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Regression: --- Mount Type: ---
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oVirt Team: --- RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host:
Cloudforms Team: --- Target Upstream Version:
Embargoed:

Description OSIDB Bzimport 2026-09-17 17:45:23 UTC
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

fuse: check for NULL root inode in fuse_fill_super_submount

fuse_iget() can return NULL when its inode allocation fails, but
fuse_fill_super_submount() passed the result straight to get_fuse_inode()
and decremented fi->nlookup without checking it:

        root = fuse_iget(sb, parent_fi->nodeid, ...);
        fi = get_fuse_inode(root);
        fi->nlookup--;

Inside fuse_iget() the inode allocation can fail and return NULL.  The
submount root takes the iget5_locked() path, whose alloc_inode() can fail
under memory pressure (the auto-submount branch can fail the same way in
new_inode() or fuse_alloc_submount_lookup()):

        inode = iget5_locked(sb, nodeid, fuse_inode_eq, fuse_inode_set,
                             &nodeid);
        if (!inode)
                return NULL;

A NULL root makes get_fuse_inode() a container_of() on NULL and the
nlookup decrement a write to a bogus address, oopsing the mount.  With
CONFIG_KASAN the following null pointer dereference is reported when the
root inode allocation of an auto-submount fails (e.g. under memory
pressure):

==================================================================
BUG: KASAN: null-ptr-deref in fuse_get_tree_submount+0x656/0x8b0
Read of size 8 at addr 00000000000002b0 by task ls/942
CPU: 0 PID: 942 Comm: ls Tainted: G W 6.6 #15
Call Trace:
 <TASK>
 fuse_get_tree_submount+0x656/0x8b0
 vfs_get_tree+0x48/0x140
 fc_mount+0x13/0x50
 fuse_dentry_automount+0x7a/0xb0
 __traverse_mounts+0xca/0x330
 step_into+0x339/0xac0
 path_lookupat+0xc5/0x2f0
 filename_lookup+0x163/0x2a0
 vfs_statx+0xd5/0x200
 do_statx+0x83/0xd0
 __x64_sys_statx+0xa0/0xc0
 do_syscall_64+0x37/0x90
 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x78/0xe2
 </TASK>
==================================================================

Return -ENOMEM instead; the caller tears down the partially built
superblock on error, matching the other error returns in this
function.