CVE-2026-64455 USB: chaoskey: Fix slab-use-after-free in chaoskey_release()
A use-after-free in the Linux kernel chaoskey USB driver allows local attackers to cause a system crash or potentially execute code by closing the device file after unplugging.
- 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-2026-64455?
CVE-2026-64455 is an use after free vulnerability in Linux, published on 25 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:
USB: chaoskey: Fix slab-use-after-free in chaoskey_release()
The chaoskey driver has a use-after-free bug in its release routine. If the user closes the device file after the USB device has been unplugged, a debugging log statement will try to access the usb_interface structure after it has been deallocated:
BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in dev_driver_string (drivers/base/core.c:2406) Read of size 8 at addr ffff888168e8a0b8 by task chaoskey_raw_re/10106
Hardware name: QEMU Ubuntu 24.04 PC v2 (i440FX + PIIX, arch_caps fix, 1996), BIOS 1.16.3-debian-1.16.3-2 04/01/2014 Call Trace: <TASK> dump_stack_lvl (lib/dump_stack.c:94 lib/dump_stack.c:120) print_report (mm/kasan/report.c:378 mm/kasan/report.c:482) kasan_report (mm/kasan/report.c:595) dev_driver_string (drivers/base/core.c:2406) __dynamic_dev_dbg (lib/dynamic_debug.c:906) chaoskey_release (drivers/usb/misc/chaoskey.c:323) __fput (fs/file_table.c:510) fput_close_sync (fs/file_table.c:615) __x64_sys_close (fs/open.c:1507 fs/open.c:1492 fs/open.c:1492) do_syscall_64 (arch/x86/entry/syscall_64.c:63 arch/x86/entry/syscall_64.c:94) entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe (arch/x86/entry/entry_64.S:121)
The driver's last reference to the interface structure is dropped in the chaoskey_free() routine, so the code must not use the interface -- even in a debugging statement -- after that routine returns. (Exception: If we know that another reference is held by someone else, such as the device core while the disconnect routine runs, there's no problem. Thanks to Johan Hovold for pointing this out.)
Since the bad access is part of an unimportant debugging statement, we can fix the problem simply by removing the whole statement.
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-64455?
How do I fix CVE-2026-64455?
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-2026-64455 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-64455 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as BELL-CVE-2026-64455, DEBIAN-CVE-2026-64455, GHSA-w6hm-pc27-4xcr, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2204-CVE-2026-64455, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-64455.