CVE-2026-98682 smb: client: drain and invalidate before server-side copy/clone
A race condition in the Linux kernel SMB client allows local attackers to corrupt files by exploiting unsynchronized page cache invalidation during server-side copy operations.
- 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-2026-98682?
CVE-2026-98682 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.
Official description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
smb: client: drain and invalidate before server-side copy/clone
cifs_file_copychunk_range() and the clone (FICLONE) path of cifs_remap_file_range() do not serialise the destination page cache against the server-side copy the way the other server-side range operations (smb3_zero_range(), smb3_punch_hole(), smb3_collapse_range() and smb3_insert_range()) do.
cifs_file_copychunk_range() invalidates the destination range with filemap_invalidate_inode(), which takes and drops the mapping's invalidate_lock internally, so the lock is no longer held when the copychunk ioctl is issued. It also never drains in-flight netfs I/O on the target. The clone path never takes the invalidate_lock at all (only i_rwsem), uses a bare truncate_inode_pages_range() and likewise does not drain outstanding I/O.
As a result an asynchronous destination writeback can complete after the server-side copy/clone has run and reinstate stale data over the region just written by the server, corrupting the file. This is the same class of corruption as commit d7d2adcd022b ("smb/client: flush dirty data before punching a hole") and has been seen randomly in generic/363 against Windows Server.
Fix both paths to follow the established ordering: hold the target mapping's invalidate_lock across the flush and invalidation of the destination and the server ioctl, and call netfs_wait_for_outstanding_io() on the target to drain in-flight writes before the ioctl is issued. Only the target inode's invalidate_lock is required, as the source is merely flushed and not invalidated; i_rwsem (already held via lock_two_nondirectories()) is acquired before the invalidate_lock, matching the VFS lock ordering. Since filemap_invalidate_inode() takes that same lock internally, replace it with its own unmap/flush/invalidate steps instead of calling it, and return early on a zero-length copy to avoid a range underflow.
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-98682?
How do I fix CVE-2026-98682?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Is CVE-2026-98682 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-98682 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as BELL-CVE-2026-98682, DEBIAN-CVE-2026-98682, GHSA-78hr-gpp6-3qpr, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-98682.