System crash via invalid crypto compressor cleanup
Published Feb 4, 2026 · Updated Feb 4, 2026
Denial of service in Linux Kernel 6.15 through 6.18.5 allows local users able to invoke hibernation to crash the kernel. The save_compressed_image() and load_compressed_image() cleanup paths pass an ERR_PTR from failed crypto_alloc_acomp() to crypto_free_acomp(), which dereferences an invalid pointer. The failure occurs when the configured compression algorithm is unavailable, such as when CONFIG_CRYPTO_LZO is disabled, and causes a system-wide kernel crash.
Summary
What happened
Denial of service in Linux Kernel 6.15 through 6.18.5 allows local users able to invoke hibernation to crash the kernel. The save_compressed_image() and load_compressed_image() cleanup paths pass an ERR_PTR from failed crypto_alloc_acomp() to crypto_free_acomp(), which dereferences an invalid pointer. The failure occurs when the configured compression algorithm is unavailable, such as when CONFIG_CRYPTO_LZO is disabled, and causes a system-wide kernel crash.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2026-23044
- Published
- Feb 4, 2026
- Updated
- Feb 4, 2026
- Vendor
- The Linux Kernel Organization
- Product
- Linux Kernel
- Classifications
- T1499
- Attack vector
- local
- Privileges
- Unavailable
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Feb 4, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Feb 4, 2026Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
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Is a vulnerable build present?
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- Affected versionversion=6.15
- Affected versionversion=b03d542c3c9569f549b1ba0cf7f4d90151fbf8ab <7966cf0ebe32c981bfa3db252cb5fc3bb1bf2e77
- Affected versionversion=b03d542c3c9569f549b1ba0cf7f4d90151fbf8ab <b7a883b0135dbc6817e90a829421c9fc8cd94bad
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What is affected?
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Attacks
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Technologies
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Your stack
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