Bug 2516463 (CVE-2026-72209) - CVE-2026-72209 kernel: ntfs: validate attribute values on lookup
Summary: CVE-2026-72209 kernel: ntfs: validate attribute values on lookup
Keywords:
Status: NEW
Alias: CVE-2026-72209
Product: Security Response
Classification: Other
Component: vulnerability
Version: unspecified
Hardware: All
OS: Linux
medium
medium
Target Milestone: ---
Assignee: Product Security DevOps Team
QA Contact:
URL:
Whiteboard:
Depends On:
Blocks:
TreeView+ depends on / blocked
 
Reported: 2026-08-15 06:13 UTC by OSIDB Bzimport
Modified: 2026-08-18 15:42 UTC (History)
2 users (show)

Fixed In Version:
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Description OSIDB Bzimport 2026-08-15 06:13:50 UTC
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

ntfs: validate attribute values on lookup

ntfs_attr_find() and ntfs_external_attr_find() check that generic
resident attribute values fit in their attribute records and that
fixed-size resident values are large enough. For variable-length resident
formats, however, the fixed part is not enough: embedded length fields
can still point callers past the resident value.

A crafted image can set a small resident $FILE_NAME value_length while
leaving file_name_length large. Callers then trust file_name_length and
read past the resident value when converting or comparing the name. This
was reproduced with a crafted image under KASAN as a slab-out-of-bounds
read from the kmalloc-1k MFT record copy. The stack included
ntfs_lookup(), ntfs_iget(), ntfs_read_locked_inode(), ntfs_attr_name_get(),
ntfs_ucstonls(), and utf16s_to_utf8s().

Add a shared attribute value validator and use it before a lookup path
can return an attribute, including the AT_UNUSED enumeration case where
callers inspect returned attributes directly. The helper validates
resident value bounds, minimum resident value sizes, variable-length
$FILE_NAME fields, and non-resident mapping-pairs metadata that was
previously checked separately in both lookup paths.

This also preserves the intended resident @val matching semantics in the
external attribute lookup path. The old duplicated validation block
overwrote the actual resident value length with the type-specific minimum
length before comparing @val, so variable-length resident values could
fail to match even when the bytes were identical. Keep the comparison on
the actual value length, and make ntfs_attrlist_entry_add() compare
resident attributes with lowest_vcn zero instead of reading the
non-resident union member after a successful resident match.

Reject non-resident $FILE_NAME records too: the format requires
$FILE_NAME to be resident and callers treat returned records as resident.


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