How severe is CVE-2026-90172?

CVE-2026-90172 has a CVSS score of 7.5/10, rated HIGH. Immediate patching is strongly recommended.

Which packages are affected by CVE-2026-90172?

CVE-2026-90172 affects the following packages: Kernel (Linux). Ecosystems affected: Linux.

How do I fix CVE-2026-90172?

Update Kernel to 7.2.6 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2026-90172 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.

How do I detect CVE-2026-90172 in my Linux dependencies?

Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for Kernel, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.

How do I mitigate CVE-2026-90172 if there is no patch (or I can't update yet)?

If you can't upgrade right away: gate or disable the affected feature, validate untrusted input at the boundary, and avoid passing attacker-controlled data into the vulnerable path. O3's runtime protection blocks exploitation in production as an interim safeguard until the upgrade lands.

How does O3 Security protect against CVE-2026-90172?

O3 Security's impact-aware SCA analyses which vulnerable code paths your application actually calls, so a match like CVE-2026-90172 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.

Is CVE-2026-90172 actively exploited in the wild?

No public exploit code has been indexed for CVE-2026-90172 yet. This does not mean the vulnerability cannot be exploited — absence of public exploits does not imply safety. Apply the recommended fix and use O3 Security to monitor your exposure.

What is the EPSS score for CVE-2026-90172?

CVE-2026-90172 has an EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) score of 0.2%, placing it in the 9th percentile of all CVEs. EPSS is maintained by FIRST.org and estimates the probability that a vulnerability will be exploited in the wild within the next 30 days. This score indicates relatively lower exploitation probability, though the CVSS severity should still guide your patching priority.

When was CVE-2026-90172 published, and has it been updated?

CVE-2026-90172 was published on September 17, 2026 and was last updated on September 19, 2026. Advisory data evolves as severity scores, affected ranges, and exploit intelligence are revised — always check the latest version of the advisory before acting.

🐧

🐧 Linux

Not in CISA KEV

HIGH severity

CVE-2026-90172 — Kernel

HIGH

CVE-2026-90172 is a high-severity (CVSS 7.5) vulnerability in Kernel. A fix is available for Kernel — see the affected versions and patch details below.

smb: smbdirect: destroy QP before mem pools on accept failure

Published

Sep 17, 2026

Updated

Sep 19, 2026

Affected

1 pkg

Patched

1 / 1

Exploits

None indexed

Exploitation data as of Sep 18, 2026 · OSV.dev, NVD, FIRST.org (EPSS)

EPSS Exploitation Probability

via FIRST.org ↗

0.2%probability of exploitation in next 30 days

Lower Risk0.00%

Lower risk than most CVEs9th percentile — riskier than 9% of all scored CVEsHighest risk

EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) is a daily probability model maintained by FIRST.org. It estimates the likelihood a CVE will be exploited in production environments within the next 30 days, derived from real-world threat intelligence signals.

How urgent is this, really

CVE-2026-90172 plotted by exploitation likelihood (EPSS) against impact (CVSS). The shaded corner — EPSS 50%+ and CVSS 7.0+ — is where this CVE doesn't sit, though severity or exploitability alone can still warrant action.

Where this sits among everything scored

Of 377,166 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the < 10% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.

Real-World Exposure

1 pkg affected

🐧Kernel

Real-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Linux packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.

Description

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

smb: smbdirect: destroy QP before mem pools on accept failure

On the rdma_accept_failed error path of smbdirect_accept_connect_request(), the receive io posted just above is owned by the QP (recv_io is set to NULL after a successful post). The error path fell through to smbdirect_connection_destroy_mem_pools() before smbdirect_connection_destroy_qp(), so the mem pools and the recv_io slab cache were destroyed while that recv_io was still outstanding on the QP.

The drain in smbdirect_connection_destroy_qp() (ib_drain_qp()) is what runs the recv completion that returns the recv_io to the free list, so destroying the pools first leaves the object outstanding at kmem_cache_destroy() time ("Slab cache still has objects") and later frees it into an already-destroyed mempool (mempool_free_bulk NULL-pointer dereference).

Give rdma_accept_failed its own teardown that drains the QP first, then destroys the mem pools, and returns. The remaining labels (post_recv_io_failed onward) run before the recv_io was ever posted, so they keep the mem-pools-then-qp order.

The outstanding recv_io at kmem_cache_destroy() time:

[ 3487.344647] ============================================================================= [ 3487.349942] BUG smbdirect_recv_io_cache_ffff88811ba99000 (Not tainted): Objects remaining on __kmem_cache_shutdown() [ 3487.356078] ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- [ 3487.356078] [ 3487.356738] Object 0xffff8881511c3440 @offset=13376 [ 3487.358464] Allocated in mempool_alloc_noprof+0x18c/0x290 age=1194 cpu=6 pid=22254 [ 3487.361197] mempool_alloc_noprof+0x18c/0x290 [ 3487.361542] smbdirect_connection_create_mem_pools+0x405/0x780 [ 3487.361972] smbdirect_accept_connect_request+0x5a8/0x1b80 [ 3487.362359] smbdirect_listen_rdma_event_handler+0x1579/0x1b90 [ 3487.362779] cma_cm_event_handler+0x9c/0x230 [ 3487.363096] cma_ib_req_handler+0x2682/0x45d0 [ 3487.363414] cm_process_work+0x56/0x3d0 [ 3487.363676] cm_work_handler+0x8a0e/0xd000 [ 3487.367496] process_scheduled_works+0xa07/0x13a0 [ 3487.367859] worker_thread+0x7c9/0xc80 [ 3487.368148] kthread+0x341/0x430 [ 3487.368407] ret_from_fork+0x3a8/0x7a0 [ 3487.368704] ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30 [ 3487.370307] Slab 0xffffea0005447000 objects=19 used=1 fp=0xffff8881511c0040 flags=0x100000000000240(workingset|head|node=0|zone=2) [ 3487.372840] ------------[ cut here ]------------ [ 3487.373195] WARNING: mm/slub.c:1244 at __slab_err+0x1a/0x30, CPU#6: kworker/6:84/22254 [ 3487.373759] Modules linked in: [ 3487.373993] CPU: 6 UID: 0 PID: 22254 Comm: kworker/6:84 Tainted: G B 7.1.0-next-20260623+ #88 PREEMPT(lazy) [ 3487.374778] Tainted: [B]=BAD_PAGE [ 3487.377830] Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (i440FX + PIIX, 1996), BIOS 1.17.0-debian-1.17.0-1 04/01/2014 [ 3487.378515] Workqueue: ib_cm cm_work_handler [ 3487.378820] RIP: 0010:__slab_err+0x1a/0x30 [ 3487.379129] Code: 90 90 90 90 90 90 90 90 90 90 90 90 90 90 90 90 0f 1f 44 00 00 e8 36 00 00 00 bf 05 00 00 00 be 01 00 00 00 e8 f7 75 45 00 90 <0f> 0b 90 c3 cc cc cc cc cc 66 66 66 66 2e 0f 1f 84 00 00 00 00 00 [ 3487.383255] RSP: 0018:ffff888220fc7050 EFLAGS: 00010093 [ 3487.383643] RAX: ffffffff8168e60a RBX: ffff88810955e640 RCX: ffff88821c381d80 [ 3487.384158] RDX: 0000000000000000 RSI: 0000000000000008 RDI: ffffffff870fa080 [ 3487.384662] RBP: ffff888220fc7068 R08: ffffffff870fa087 R09: 1ffffffff0e1f410 [ 3487.385192] R10: dffffc0000000000 R11: fffffbfff0e1f411 R12: ffffea0005447210 [ 3487.385674] R13: ffffea0005447000 R14: ffff888220fc7068 R15: ffff88812a8ab300 [ 3487.388932] FS: 0000000000000000(0000) GS:ffff888427e76000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000 [ 3487.389529] CS: 0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033 [ 3487.389934] CR2: 00007ffcf2d84fd8 CR3: 0000000111d64006 CR4: 0000000000f72ef0 [ 3487.390440] PKRU: 55555554 [ 3487.390641] Call Trace: [ 3487.390826] <TASK> [ 3 ---truncated---

Affected Packages

1 total 1 fixed

Ecosystem	Package	Vulnerable range	Fix
🐧Linux	`Kernel`	≥ 7.1.0&&< 7.2.6	7.2.6

Detection & mitigation playbook

Open-source dependency

Detect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for Kernel, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update Kernel to 7.2.6 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2026-90172 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
If you can't upgrade right away: gate or disable the affected feature, validate untrusted input at the boundary, and avoid passing attacker-controlled data into the vulnerable path. O3's runtime protection blocks exploitation in production as an interim safeguard until the upgrade lands.
How O3 protects you
O3 Security's impact-aware SCA analyses which vulnerable code paths your application actually calls, so a match like CVE-2026-90172 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.

Tailored to CVE-2026-90172. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.

Frequently Asked Questions

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: smb: smbdirect: destroy QP before mem pools on accept failure On the rdma_accept_failed error path of smbdirect_accept_connect_request(), the receive io posted just above is owned by the QP (recv_io is set to NULL after a successful post). The error path fell through to smbdirect_connection_destroy_mem_pools() before smbdirect_connection_destroy_qp(), so the mem pools and the recv_io slab cache were destroyed while that recv_io was still outstanding on the QP. The drain in smbdirect_connection_destroy_qp() (ib_drain_qp())

O3 Security · Impact-Aware SCA

Is CVE-2026-90172 in your dependencies?

O3 Security finds CVE-2026-90172 across Linux dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.

Scan my dependencies How O3 SCA works