Kernel crash via uncleared reusable kprobes
Published Jul 19, 2026 · Updated Jul 19, 2026
Denial of service in the Linux Kernel kprobes test module allows local users to crash the kernel by running its sanity tests twice. Static kprobes and kretprobes in lib/tests/test_kprobes.c retain address and flag data after unregistration, so a second test run reuses uncleared probe state and registration fails. The local user must be able to invoke the debugfs KUnit kprobes test endpoint twice; the reported consequence is a kernel paging fault and system crash.
Summary
What happened
Denial of service in the Linux Kernel kprobes test module allows local users to crash the kernel by running its sanity tests twice. Static kprobes and kretprobes in lib/tests/test_kprobes.c retain address and flag data after unregistration, so a second test run reuses uncleared probe state and registration fails. The local user must be able to invoke the debugfs KUnit kprobes test endpoint twice; the reported consequence is a kernel paging fault and system crash.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2026-64163
- Published
- Jul 19, 2026
- Updated
- Jul 19, 2026
- Vendor
- The Linux Kernel Organization
- Product
- Linux Kernel
- Classifications
- CWE-459, T1499.004
- Attack vector
- local
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Jul 19, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Jul 19, 2026Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
Present is not the same as exploitable
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Is a vulnerable build present?
Compare these published version ranges with your installed build and any vendor patches.
- Affected versionversion=5.16
- Affected versionversion=e44e81c5b90f698025eadceb7eef8661eda117d5 <08d355936fcf70c81c94f9fe7310450b65c53399
- Affected versionversion=e44e81c5b90f698025eadceb7eef8661eda117d5 <1c24cf1fd67f6702c719ab73499392cb7af956ae
- Affected versionversion=e44e81c5b90f698025eadceb7eef8661eda117d5 <96515819d79f356f40da5540968d838ea570fab9
- Affected versionversion=e44e81c5b90f698025eadceb7eef8661eda117d5 <accc0004c501a9918313142282b094d408af06fb
- Affected versionversion=e44e81c5b90f698025eadceb7eef8661eda117d5 <ef5581bb30efb939cc2bf093475c6cc85258e5cd
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.
Weakness, pattern, technique
Public exploit references
No public exploit references are available in this record.
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Technologies
Your stack
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Your stack
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