Local privilege escalation via offchannel link use-after-free
Published Aug 15, 2026 · Updated Aug 15, 2026
Use-after-free in the mt76 Wi-Fi driver in affected Linux kernels starting at 6.14 allows local users to escalate privileges. mt76_put_vif_phy_link assigns NULL to the RCU pointer and immediately frees the offchannel mlink, while an existing TX reader can still dereference its wcid and idx fields. Reaching the race requires local nl80211 access with CAP_NET_ADMIN and affected mt76 hardware; exploitation can disclose or corrupt kernel memory or crash the system.
Summary
What happened
Use-after-free in the mt76 Wi-Fi driver in affected Linux kernels starting at 6.14 allows local users to escalate privileges. mt76_put_vif_phy_link assigns NULL to the RCU pointer and immediately frees the offchannel mlink, while an existing TX reader can still dereference its wcid and idx fields. Reaching the race requires local nl80211 access with CAP_NET_ADMIN and affected mt76 hardware; exploitation can disclose or corrupt kernel memory or crash the system.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2026-74325
- Published
- Aug 15, 2026
- Updated
- Aug 15, 2026
- Vendor
- The Linux Kernel Organization
- Product
- Linux
- Classifications
- CWE-416, T1068
- Attack vector
- local
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Aug 15, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Aug 15, 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=6.14
- Affected versionversion=a8f424c1287cc79a06c21816658feea87dfcb83f <50e700ac0edce72dee5c3a9755865d9423696ac7
- Affected versionversion=a8f424c1287cc79a06c21816658feea87dfcb83f <7fae097aa9a56c30febf539d72ef3773165d3aa3
- Affected versionversion=a8f424c1287cc79a06c21816658feea87dfcb83f <c7a83899203ed36696a2d35ddd03c0f522874a63
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Published CVSS scores
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Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
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Public exploit references
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Technologies
Your stack
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Your stack
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