Bug 2559805 (CVE-2026-98975)

Summary: CVE-2026-98975 kernel: xfs: stop exchanging reflink flags when exchanging mappings
Product: [Other] Security Response Reporter: OSIDB Bzimport <bzimport>
Component: vulnerabilityAssignee: Product Security DevOps Team <prodsec-dev>
Status: NEW --- QA Contact:
Severity: medium Docs Contact:
Priority: medium    
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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A flaw was found in the Linux kernel's XFS file system. A local user could exploit this flaw to cause data corruption across shared files during file exchange operations. When exchanging file storage mappings, the kernel may improperly clear the reference link (reflink) flag that marks blocks as shared. As a result, subsequent writes modify the shared blocks directly in place instead of creating a new copy through Copy-on-Write (CoW), inadvertently corrupting other files sharing those blocks.
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oVirt Team: --- RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host:
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Description OSIDB Bzimport 2026-10-23 13:43:27 UTC
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

xfs: stop exchanging reflink flags when exchanging mappings

When an exchange covers both files from offset 0 to i_disk_size,
xmi_can_exchange_reflink_flags() assumes every mapping moved and hands
the reflink flag over to the other file.

That assumption is wrong.  A file can still own shared blocks past
i_disk_size, e.g. after EXCHANGE_RANGE_TO_EOF sets a smaller size
without unmapping anything.  The flag is cleared anyway, and the next
write to such a block happens in place instead of CoW, corrupting the
other file that shares it.

Commit a23eca88448e ("xfs: fix exchange-range reflink flag clearing
issue with INO1_WRITTEN") fixed one instance of this.  Rather than add
another special case, stop moving the flags.
xfs_exchmaps_ensure_reflink() already sets the flag on both inodes
before the exchange, so both just keep it.

Nothing sets CLEAR_INO{1,2}_REFLINK anymore.  Intents logged by older
kernels may still carry them; recovery already masks them off, so they
stay in the log format mask and are ignored.

XFS_IOC_SWAPEXT has the same problem: it moves the reflink flag from
one inode to the other along with the extents.  Just removing that is
not enough here: the exchange path flags both inodes up front in
xfs_exchmaps_ensure_reflink(), but swapext has no such step, so the
inode receiving the shared extents would be left without the flag.
Set it on both inodes instead, and make sure both have a CoW fork,
since an inode with the reflink flag is expected to have one.

The flag now stays until FALLOC_FL_UNSHARE_RANGE, xfs_scrub, or a
truncate to zero removes it.