# CVE-2026-99081: bnxt_en: fix DMA mapping length for padded small packets


- **Severity:** High 7.5 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 23 Oct 2026
- **Updated:** 24 Oct 2026
- **Also known as:** AZL-110984, BELL-CVE-2026-99081, DEBIAN-CVE-2026-99081, GHSA-9368-hxmw-4c4j, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-99081

## What is CVE-2026-99081?

CVE-2026-99081 is a high-severity vulnerability in Linux, published on 23 Oct 2026. 

### Official description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

bnxt_en: fix DMA mapping length for padded small packets

Stefan Fleischmann reported Intel IOMMU DMA Read faults on BCM57412
NetXtreme-E NICs when transmitting packets on VLAN/macvlan interfaces:

  DMAR: [DMA Read NO_PASID] Request device [18:00.0] fault addr 0xfc499000
        [fault reason 0x06] PTE Read access is not set
  bnxt_en 0000:18:00.0 eno1np0: Abandoning msg {0xb4 0x41a} len: 0 due to firmware status: 0x2000001
  ...
  NETDEV WATCHDOG: eno1np0 (bnxt_en): transmit queue 0 timed out

The fault address (0xfc499000) is on an exact 4KB page boundary,
pointing to a DMA read buffer overrun.

In bnxt_start_xmit(), packets smaller than BNXT_MIN_PKT_SIZE (52 bytes),
such as 42-byte untagged ARP frames, are padded:

    if (length < BNXT_MIN_PKT_SIZE) {
        pad = BNXT_MIN_PKT_SIZE - length;
        if (skb_pad(skb, pad))
            goto tx_kick_pending;
        length = BNXT_MIN_PKT_SIZE;
    }

    mapping = dma_map_single(&pdev->dev, skb->data, len, DMA_TO_DEVICE);
    ...
    dma_unmap_len_set(tx_buf, len, len);

However, 'len' was initialized earlier to skb_headlen(skb) (e.g. 42 bytes)
and is left unadjusted after padding. Consequently, dma_map_single() and
dma_unmap_len_set() map and track only 42 bytes.

Later, the hardware TX buffer descriptor is programmed with the padded length:

    txbd->tx_bd_len_flags_type =
        cpu_to_le32(((len + pad) << TX_BD_LEN_SHIFT) | flags |
                    TX_BD_FLAGS_PACKET_END);

The NIC DMA engine is thus instructed to read 52 bytes from a region where
only 42 bytes were DMA-mapped. If skb->data ends near the boundary of a 4KB
page (within 'pad' bytes of the next page), the hardware DMA read overruns
into the unmapped adjacent page, triggering an IOMMU fault.

This issue was exposed after commit 447cbe95ebb9 ("vlan: fix skb_under_panic
and races when toggling HW VLAN offload") because reserving extra VLAN
headroom rounded LL_RESERVED_SPACE from 48 up to 64 bytes, shifting skb->data
offsets and potentially causing small frames to land right against page
boundaries.

Fix this by using skb_put_padto(skb, BNXT_MIN_PKT_SIZE) in
bnxt_start_xmit(), before skb_shinfo(skb)->nr_frags is sampled,
because padding might linearize the skb.
This ensures skb->len and skb_headlen(skb) reflect the padded size so
that dma_map_single() maps the full buffer and the descriptor length is
consistent. This also removes the temporary 'pad' variable and masking logic.

The padding is done after the SW USO branch, otherwise
bnxt_sw_udp_gso_xmit() would account the padding as UDP payload
and send it in extra segments.

Note that SW USO segments are still not padded: with IPv4, a segment
carrying less than 10 bytes of UDP payload (small gso_size, or a short
last segment) is sent as a frame shorter than BNXT_MIN_PKT_SIZE.
This is a separate issue, left for a followup patch.

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-99081?


## How do I fix CVE-2026-99081?

Upgrade to a fixed version.

## Is CVE-2026-99081 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-99081 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2026-99081 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2026-99081 is a high-severity vulnerability in Linux, published on 23 Oct 2026. 
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-99081 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Linux. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. 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.
2. 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.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-99081/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-99081/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-99081
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-99081
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2026-99081

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-99081/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.