CVE-2026-98706 wifi: mac80211: drain PS delivery work during station teardown
A race condition in Linux kernel Wi-Fi station teardown allows denial of service by triggering use-after-free or state inconsistencies during power-save frame delivery.
- Exploited in the wild
- Not known
- Login needed
- Not needed
- Attackable
- Local or same network only
- Victim action needed
- Not needed
- Fix
- Available
What is CVE-2026-98706?
CVE-2026-98706 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:
wifi: mac80211: drain PS delivery work during station teardown
Removing an AP or mesh station can notify the driver and wake TXQs after the station has already been removed from the driver, and can update num_sta_ps and the power-save queues after station cleanup has purged them.
sta_deliver_ps_frames() tests sta->dead only before it starts delivery. A worker that passes that test can be delayed while teardown sets sta->dead and removes the station from the driver; when it resumes it still runs the full delivery.
The existing cancel_work_sync() sits near the end of __cleanup_single_sta(), after the final driver state transition and after PS accounting and queue purging, so it drains the worker only once the state it has to protect has already changed. Before commit d34ba2168a3c ("mac80211: don't delay station destruction") cleanup was deferred through the same ordered workqueue as the delivery work, which kept the two ordered.
Cancel the work after setting sta->dead and before moving the driver state, and move the existing cancellation to the start of __cleanup_single_sta(). The first drain closes the driver-lifetime window; driver callbacks during the remaining state transitions can still queue drv_deliver_wk through ieee80211_sta_block_awake(), so retain the second drain at the start of __cleanup_single_sta(). That drain also covers insertion failures, which reach cleanup without setting sta->dead.
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-98706?
How do I fix CVE-2026-98706?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Is CVE-2026-98706 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-98706 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as AZL-108962, BELL-CVE-2026-98706, DEBIAN-CVE-2026-98706, GHSA-24rr-93xv-vqrr, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-98706.