{"answers":{"affected":"","exploited":"There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-98551 in the wild and no public exploit code.","fix":"Apply the vendor's patch.","what":"CVE-2026-98551 is a vulnerability in Linux, published on 18 Oct 2026. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim."},"fix_prompt":"Check this codebase for CVE-2026-98551 and fix it if it is affected.\n\nWhat it is: CVE-2026-98551 is a vulnerability in Linux, published on 18 Oct 2026. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.\nExploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-98551 in the wild and no public exploit code.\n\nAffected product: Linux. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.\n\nTask:\n1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.\n2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.\n3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.\n4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.\n5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.\n\nReference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-98551/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-98551/index.md)","id":"CVE-2026-98551","markdown":"https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-98551/index.md","name":"CVE-2026-98551","record":{"aliases":["AZL-109389","BELL-CVE-2026-98551","DEBIAN-CVE-2026-98551","GHSA-r5w5-qjwh-6pq3","UBUNTU-CVE-2026-98551"],"analysis":{"component_type":"kernel","fix_type":"patch","impacts":["data_read"],"network_reachable":"adjacent_or_local","non_default_config":false,"product_category":"Linux kernel","requires_auth":"none","summary":"Local attackers can read uninitialized kernel memory via perf branch entries on arm64 systems due to missing field initialization.","user_interaction":"not_required","vuln_class":"information_disclosure"},"analysis_generated_by":"qwen3.8-flash-next","assigner":"Linux","cpe":[],"cvss":{"score":null,"severity":null,"source":null,"vector":null,"version":null},"cwes":[],"description":"In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:\n\nperf/core: Fill branch entries with a single assignment\n\nperf_clear_branch_entry_bitfields() clears the bitfields of struct\nperf_branch_entry one by one and leaves from/to alone, since callers\noverwrite those straight away. The list has to be kept in sync with the\nstruct by hand and has already fallen behind: new_type and priv were\nadded to perf_branch_entry and never added here.\n\nOnly BRBE writes those two, and neither for every record.\nbrbe_set_perf_entry_type() leaves new_type alone for a branch type it\ndoes not recognise, and priv is not set for source-only records.\narm_pmuv3.c allocates the per-CPU branch stack with kmalloc(), so such a\nrecord reaches userspace with whatever the slot held: uninitialised\nkmalloc() data on the first pass over the buffer, the previous record's\nvalues after that. Nothing under arch/x86/events/ writes either field,\nso only arm64 is affected.\n\nAssign the whole entry at each site instead. Everything not named is\nthen zero, and there is no list to keep in sync. The bitfields add up to\nexactly 64 bits, so the struct has no padding to leave undefined.\n\nperf_clear_branch_entry_bitfields() has no callers left, so remove it.\nperf_entry_from_brbe_regset() assigns an empty literal instead, since it\nfills from/to conditionally. PERF_BR_SPEC_NA is 0, so dropping the\nexplicit spec assignment changes nothing.","ecosystems":[],"exploits":{"exploitdb":0,"first_seen":null,"github_poc":0,"max_poc_stars":null,"metasploit":0,"nuclei":0,"refs":[],"tier":"none_known"},"has_fix":true,"headline":"perf/core: Fill branch entries with a single assignment","id":"CVE-2026-98551","indexable":true,"kev":null,"kind":"cve","links":{"ecosystem":null,"product":null,"products":[],"type":"information_disclosure","year":"2026"},"n_packages":0,"n_references":2,"next":{"headline":"perf/core: Fix a refcount leak in attach_perf_ctx_data()","id":"CVE-2026-98552"},"packages":[],"prev":{"headline":"tipc: reject invalid and unexpected GRP_ACK_MSG to prevent bc_ackers underflow","id":"CVE-2026-98550"},"products":["Linux"],"published":"2026-10-18","related":[],"sources":[{"class":"attribution","licence":"CVE Terms of Use (MITRE)","name":"CVE List","prefix":"CVE"}],"ssvc":{"automatable":null,"exploitation":null,"technical_impact":null},"state":"PUBLISHED","updated":"2026-10-19","vendors":["Linux"]},"summary":"Local attackers can read uninitialized kernel memory via perf branch entries on arm64 systems due to missing field initialization.","url":"https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-98551/"}