Bug 2559787 (CVE-2026-98994)

Summary:	CVE-2026-98994 kernel: statmount: read the parent of an unmounted mount under mount_lock
Product:	[Other] Security Response	Reporter:	OSIDB Bzimport <bzimport>
Component:	vulnerability	Assignee:	Product Security DevOps Team <prodsec-dev>
Status:	NEW ---	QA Contact:
Severity:	medium	Docs Contact:
Priority:	medium
Version:	unspecified	CC:	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
Whiteboard:
Fixed In Version:		Doc Type:	---
Doc Text:	A flaw was found in the Linux kernel. A local user could exploit a race condition in the statmount facility to cause a use-after-free condition, resulting in a kernel crash and Denial of Service (DoS). When querying an unmounted filesystem mount via an open file descriptor, the kernel fails to properly lock the parent mount structure, allowing concurrent cleanup operations to free the structure while it is being accessed.	Story Points:	---
Clone Of:		Environment:
Last Closed:		Type:	---
Regression:	---	Mount Type:	---
Documentation:	---	CRM:
Verified Versions:		Category:	---
oVirt Team:	---	RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host:
Cloudforms Team:	---	Target Upstream Version:
Embargoed:

Description OSIDB Bzimport 2026-10-23 13:37:53 UTC

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

statmount: read the parent of an unmounted mount under mount_lock

statmount_mnt_basic() reads the ids of the parent through m->mnt_parent
with namespace_sem held for reading. That's fine for a mount that is
in a namespace. Everything above it is pinned by that namespace.

STATMOUNT_BY_FD also accepts a file descriptor on a mount that has
been unmounted on purpose and that only the file descriptor keeps alive.
If that mount stayed attached to its parent when it was unmounted the
parent is unmounted as well and nothing pins it for the child.

The final mntput() unmounts the children under mount_lock alone and
frees the parent afterwards. Concurrently, statmount_mnt_basic() reads
m->mnt_parent twice while that can happen and can easily dereference a
mount that's already gone.

Read the parent of an unmounted mount under mount_lock. The parent
can't be put while it is held and both ids come from the same mount. A
mounted mount's parent is pinned by the namespace and a mount can't
leave its namespace while namespace_sem is held, so the common case
takes no global lock.