CVE-2026-63951 zram: fix use-after-free in zram_writeback_endio
A race condition in the Linux kernel zram writeback handler causes a use-after-free, leading to a system crash.
- 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
What is CVE-2026-63951?
CVE-2026-63951 is a high-severity use after free vulnerability in Linux, published on 19 Jul 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:
zram: fix use-after-free in zram_writeback_endio
A crash was observed in zram_writeback_endio due to a NULL pointer dereference in wake_up. The root cause is a race condition between the bio completion handler (zram_writeback_endio) and the writeback task.
In zram_writeback_endio, wake_up() is called on &wb_ctl->done_wait after releasing wb_ctl->done_lock. This creates a race window where the writeback task can see num_inflight become 0, return, and free wb_ctl before zram_writeback_endio calls wake_up().
CPU 0 (zram_writeback_endio) CPU 1 (writeback_store) ============================ ============================ zram_writeback_slots zram_submit_wb_request zram_submit_wb_request wait_event(wb_ctl->done_wait) spin_lock(&wb_ctl->done_lock); list_add(&req->entry, &wb_ctl->done_reqs); spin_unlock(&wb_ctl->done_lock); wake_up(&wb_ctl->done_wait); zram_complete_done_reqs spin_lock(&wb_ctl->done_lock); list_add(&req->entry, &wb_ctl->done_reqs); spin_unlock(&wb_ctl->done_lock); while (num_inflight) > 0) spin_lock(&wb_ctl->done_lock); list_del(&req->entry); spin_unlock(&wb_ctl->done_lock); // num_inflight becomes 0 atomic_dec(num_inflight);
// Leave zram_writeback_slots // Free wb_ctl release_wb_ctl(wb_ctl); // UAF crash! wake_up(&wb_ctl->done_wait);
This patch fixes this race by using RCU. By protecting wb_ctl with rcu_read_lock() in zram_writeback_endio and using kfree_rcu() to free it, we ensure that wb_ctl remains valid during the execution of zram_writeback_endio.
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-63951?
How do I fix CVE-2026-63951?
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-2026-63951 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-63951 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as DEBIAN-CVE-2026-63951, GHSA-jmwm-428x-w863, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-63951.