CVE-2026-53005 af_unix: Drop all SCM attributes for SOCKMAP.

What is CVE-2026-53005?

CVE-2026-53005 is a high-severity use after free vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 24 Jun 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:

af_unix: Drop all SCM attributes for SOCKMAP.

SOCKMAP can hide inflight fd from AF_UNIX GC.

When a socket in SOCKMAP receives skb with inflight fd, sk_psock_verdict_data_ready() looks up the mapped socket and enqueue skb to its psock->ingress_skb.

Since neither the old nor the new GC can inspect the psock queue, the hidden skb leaks the inflight sockets. Note that this cannot be detected via kmemleak because inflight sockets are linked to a global list.

In addition, SOCKMAP redirect breaks the Tarjan-based GC's assumption that unix_edge.successor is always alive, which is no longer true once skb is redirected, resulting in use-after-free below. [0]

Moreover, SOCKMAP does not call scm_stat_del() properly, so unix_show_fdinfo() could report an incorrect fd count.

sk_msg_recvmsg() does not support any SCM attributes in the first place.

Let's drop all SCM attributes before passing skb to the SOCKMAP layer.

[0]: BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in unix_del_edges (net/unix/garbage.c:118 net/unix/garbage.c:181 net/unix/garbage.c:251) Read of size 8 at addr ffff888125362670 by task kworker/56:1/496

CPU: 56 UID: 0 PID: 496 Comm: kworker/56:1 Not tainted 7.0.0-rc7-00263-gb9d8b856689d #3 PREEMPT(lazy) Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (i440FX + PIIX, 1996), BIOS 1.17.0-debian-1.17.0-1 04/01/2014 Workqueue: events sk_psock_backlog Call Trace: <TASK> dump_stack_lvl (lib/dump_stack.c:122) print_report (mm/kasan/report.c:379) kasan_report (mm/kasan/report.c:597) unix_del_edges (net/unix/garbage.c:118 net/unix/garbage.c:181 net/unix/garbage.c:251) unix_destroy_fpl (net/unix/garbage.c:317) unix_destruct_scm (./include/net/scm.h:80 ./include/net/scm.h:86 net/unix/af_unix.c:1976) sk_psock_backlog (./include/linux/skbuff.h:?) process_scheduled_works (kernel/workqueue.c:?) worker_thread (kernel/workqueue.c:?) kthread (kernel/kthread.c:438) ret_from_fork (arch/x86/kernel/process.c:164) ret_from_fork_asm (arch/x86/entry/entry_64.S:258) </TASK>

Allocated by task 955: kasan_save_track (mm/kasan/common.c:58 mm/kasan/common.c:78) __kasan_slab_alloc (mm/kasan/common.c:369) kmem_cache_alloc_noprof (mm/slub.c:4539) sk_prot_alloc (net/core/sock.c:2240) sk_alloc (net/core/sock.c:2301) unix_create1 (net/unix/af_unix.c:1099) unix_create (net/unix/af_unix.c:1169) __sock_create (net/socket.c:1606) __sys_socketpair (net/socket.c:1811) __x64_sys_socketpair (net/socket.c:1863 net/socket.c:1860 net/socket.c:1860) do_syscall_64 (arch/x86/entry/syscall_64.c:?) entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe (arch/x86/entry/entry_64.S:130)

Freed by task 496: kasan_save_track (mm/kasan/common.c:58 mm/kasan/common.c:78) kasan_save_free_info (mm/kasan/generic.c:587) __kasan_slab_free (mm/kasan/common.c:287) kmem_cache_free (mm/slub.c:6165) __sk_destruct (net/core/sock.c:2282 net/core/sock.c:2384) sk_psock_destroy (./include/net/sock.h:?) process_scheduled_works (kernel/workqueue.c:?) worker_thread (kernel/workqueue.c:?) kthread (kernel/kthread.c:438) ret_from_fork (arch/x86/kernel/process.c:164) ret_from_fork_asm (arch/x86/entry/entry_64.S:258)

Weakness: CWE-416

Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-53005?

It affects 1 product.

Products include Linux kernel.

How do I fix CVE-2026-53005?

Apply the vendor's patch.

Upgrade to the fixed version. These bugs are found with fuzzing and sanitisers and avoided by memory-safe languages. More about Use after free.

Is CVE-2026-53005 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-53005 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-90540, BELL-CVE-2026-53005, DEBIAN-CVE-2026-53005, GHSA-6qfx-pmxg-8gxp, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-12-CVE-2026-53005, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-13-CVE-2026-53005 and 3 more.