Linux KernelOperating system · Linux
CVE-2026-43502
Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.
NVD · uneditedIn the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net/rds: handle zerocopy send cleanup before the message is queued A zerocopy send can fail after user pages have been pinned but before the message is attached to the sending socket. The purge path currently infers zerocopy state from rm->m_rs, so an unqueued message can be cleaned up as if it owned normal payload pages. However, zerocopy ownership is really determined by the presence of op_mmp_znotifier, regardless of whether the message has reached the socket queue. Capture op_mmp_znotifier up front in rds_message_purge() and use it as the cleanup discriminator. If the message is already associated with a socket, keep the existing completion path. Otherwise, drop the pinned page accounting directly and release the notifier before putting the payload pages. This keeps early send failure cleanup consistent with the zerocopy lifetime rules without changing the normal queued completion path.
Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.
dbcve analysisA detailed technical summary for this CVE is being prepared.
Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.
NVD · CPE data
Linux KernelOperating system
>= 4.17, < 5.10.258>= 5.11, < 5.15.209>= 5.16, < 6.1.175>= 6.2, < 6.6.140>= 6.7, < 6.12.88>= 6.13, < 6.18.30>= 6.19, < 7.0.7= 7.1CVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.
From the vector- Attack vector
- Local
- Complexity
- Low
- Privileges
- Low
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.
dbcve · scoped5.10.2585.15.2096.1.175
Linux kernel 5.10.258+ / 5.15.209+ / 6.1.175+ / 6.6.140+ (depending on which major version branch you are on)
- 1. Identify the currently running kernel version using `uname -r`
- 2. Determine which version range your current kernel falls into (>= 4.17 and < 5.10.258, >= 5.11 and < 5.15.209, >= 5.16 and < 6.1.175, or >= 6.2 and < 6.6.140)
- 3. Upgrade the Linux kernel to a version that includes the fix: for 4.17-5.10.x upgrade to 5.10.258 or later; for 5.11-5.15.x upgrade to 5.15.209 or later; for 5.16-6.1.x upgrade to 6.1.175 or later; for 6.2-6.6.x upgrade to 6.6.140 or later
- 4. For distribution kernels (e.g., RHEL, Ubuntu, Debian), use the distribution's package manager to install the updated kernel package
- 5. Reboot the system to load the patched kernel
- 6. Verify the fix is applied by checking the kernel version with `uname -r` and confirming the RDS zerocopy handling code includes the patch
Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2026-43502 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2026-43502 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
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- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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