CVE-2026-93236 media: meson: vdec: fix NULL pointer deref in vdec_try_fmt_common
A local attacker can cause a kernel crash by triggering a NULL pointer dereference in the Meson video decoder driver when using unsupported pixel formats.
- 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-2026-93236?
CVE-2026-93236 is a vulnerability in Linux, published on 24 Sep 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:
media: meson: vdec: fix NULL pointer deref in vdec_try_fmt_common
When VIDIOC_TRY_FMT is called with an unsupported pixel format on the OUTPUT queue, vdec_try_fmt_common() falls back to V4L2_PIX_FMT_MPEG2. However, if a distro has locally patched MPEG2 support out (as it has been broken for some time) the platform format table does not contain MPEG2 so find_format() returns NULL and the subsequent dereference of fmt_out->max_width triggers a NULL pointer dereference.
Fix this by falling back to the first format in the platform's format array instead of hardcoding V4L2_PIX_FMT_MPEG2. This is always valid since every platform defines at least one format.
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-93236?
How do I fix CVE-2026-93236?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Is CVE-2026-93236 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-93236 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as BELL-CVE-2026-93236, DEBIAN-CVE-2026-93236, GHSA-24fx-cxxf-wpf5, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-93236.