CVE-2026-46051 md/raid5: fix soft lockup in retry_aligned_read()

What is CVE-2026-46051?

CVE-2026-46051 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 27 May 2026. 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:

md/raid5: fix soft lockup in retry_aligned_read()

When retry_aligned_read() encounters an overlapped stripe, it releases the stripe via raid5_release_stripe() which puts it on the lockless released_stripes llist. In the next raid5d loop iteration, release_stripe_list() drains the stripe onto handle_list (since STRIPE_HANDLE is set by the original IO), but retry_aligned_read() runs before handle_active_stripes() and removes the stripe from handle_list via find_get_stripe() -> list_del_init(). This prevents handle_stripe() from ever processing the stripe to resolve the overlap, causing an infinite loop and soft lockup.

Fix this by using __release_stripe() with temp_inactive_list instead of raid5_release_stripe() in the failure path, so the stripe does not go through the released_stripes llist. This allows raid5d to break out of its loop, and the overlap will be resolved when the stripe is eventually processed by handle_stripe().

Weakness: CWE-667

Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-46051?

It affects 1 product.

Products include Linux kernel.

How do I fix CVE-2026-46051?

Apply the vendor's patch.

Upgrade, then put limits on request size, rate and nesting depth so one client cannot exhaust the service. More about Denial of service.

Is CVE-2026-46051 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-46051 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel

• CVE-2026-53266 Linux Kernel Out-of-Bounds Write Exploited High 8.8
• CVE-2013-6282 Linux Kernel Improper Input Validation Exploited High 8.8
• CVE-2022-0185 Linux Kernel Heap-Based Buffer Overflow Exploited High 8.4
• CVE-2013-2094 Linux Kernel Privilege Escalation Exploited High 8.4
• CVE-2026-53362 Linux Kernel Unspecified Exploited High 7.8

All Linux kernel vulnerabilities

Sources

• CVE record
• NVD
• OSV
• GitHub advisory
• How this page is made

Also known as AZL-88734, BELL-CVE-2026-46051, DEBIAN-CVE-2026-46051, GHSA-mgf2-2rm5-mvrf, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-11-CVE-2026-46051, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-12-CVE-2026-46051 and 3 more.