# CVE-2024-26798: fbcon: always restore the old font data in fbcon_do_set_font()

> A local attacker can trigger a kernel crash by exploiting a null pointer dereference in the fbcon font handling code during a failed resize operation.

- **Severity:** Medium 5.5 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Any signed-in user
- **Attackable:** Local or same network only
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 4 Apr 2024
- **Updated:** 23 May 2026
- **Also known as:** BELL-CVE-2024-26798, DEBIAN-CVE-2024-26798, GHSA-wm99-2g28-jp5m, UBUNTU-CVE-2024-26798

## What is CVE-2024-26798?

CVE-2024-26798 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 4 Apr 2024. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

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

fbcon: always restore the old font data in fbcon_do_set_font()

Commit a5a923038d70 (fbdev: fbcon: Properly revert changes when
vc_resize() failed) started restoring old font data upon failure (of
vc_resize()). But it performs so only for user fonts. It means that the
"system"/internal fonts are not restored at all. So in result, the very
first call to fbcon_do_set_font() performs no restore at all upon
failing vc_resize().

This can be reproduced by Syzkaller to crash the system on the next
invocation of font_get(). It's rather hard to hit the allocation failure
in vc_resize() on the first font_set(), but not impossible. Esp. if
fault injection is used to aid the execution/failure. It was
demonstrated by Sirius:
  BUG: unable to handle page fault for address: fffffffffffffff8
  #PF: supervisor read access in kernel mode
  #PF: error_code(0x0000) - not-present page
  PGD cb7b067 P4D cb7b067 PUD cb7d067 PMD 0
  Oops: 0000 [#1] PREEMPT SMP KASAN
  CPU: 1 PID: 8007 Comm: poc Not tainted 6.7.0-g9d1694dc91ce #20
  Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (i440FX + PIIX, 1996), BIOS 1.15.0-1 04/01/2014
  RIP: 0010:fbcon_get_font+0x229/0x800 drivers/video/fbdev/core/fbcon.c:2286
  Call Trace:
   <TASK>
   con_font_get drivers/tty/vt/vt.c:4558 [inline]
   con_font_op+0x1fc/0xf20 drivers/tty/vt/vt.c:4673
   vt_k_ioctl drivers/tty/vt/vt_ioctl.c:474 [inline]
   vt_ioctl+0x632/0x2ec0 drivers/tty/vt/vt_ioctl.c:752
   tty_ioctl+0x6f8/0x1570 drivers/tty/tty_io.c:2803
   vfs_ioctl fs/ioctl.c:51 [inline]
  ...

So restore the font data in any case, not only for user fonts. Note the
later 'if' is now protected by 'old_userfont' and not 'old_data' as the
latter is always set now. (And it is supposed to be non-NULL. Otherwise
we would see the bug above again.)

Weakness: CWE-770 (Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2024-26798?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Linux kernel.

## How do I fix CVE-2024-26798?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2024-26798 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2024-26798 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel

- [CVE-2026-53266](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-53266/): Linux Kernel Out-of-Bounds Write (high 8.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2013-6282](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2013-6282/): Linux Kernel Improper Input Validation (high 8.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2022-0185](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-0185/): Linux Kernel Heap-Based Buffer Overflow (high 8.4, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2013-2094](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2013-2094/): Linux Kernel Privilege Escalation (high 8.4, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2026-53362](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-53362/): Linux Kernel Unspecified (high 7.8, exploited in the wild)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2024-26798 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2024-26798 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 4 Apr 2024. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2024-26798 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Linux kernel. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-26798/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-26798/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2024-26798
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2024-26798
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2024-26798

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-26798/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.