Physical-memory access via stale SRAM size
Published Sep 25, 2026 · Updated Sep 25, 2026
Memory-mapping failure handling in the Linux kernel 6.19 Ethos-U driver allows local users to direct NPU jobs to physical address zero. ethosu_sram_init records the SRAM pool size before allocation and, on allocation failure, leaves that size nonzero while the physical pointer remains zero. Reachability requires an Arm Ethos-U device, an SRAM mapping failure, and permission to submit accelerator jobs; resulting jobs access an unintended physical region.
Summary
What happened
Memory-mapping failure handling in the Linux kernel 6.19 Ethos-U driver allows local users to direct NPU jobs to physical address zero. ethosu_sram_init records the SRAM pool size before allocation and, on allocation failure, leaves that size nonzero while the physical pointer remains zero. Reachability requires an Arm Ethos-U device, an SRAM mapping failure, and permission to submit accelerator jobs; resulting jobs access an unintended physical region.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2026-97912
- Published
- Sep 25, 2026
- Updated
- Sep 25, 2026
- Vendor
- The Linux Kernel Organization
- Product
- Linux
- Classifications
- Unavailable
- Attack vector
- local
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Sep 25, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Sep 25, 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?
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- Affected versionversion=5a5e9c0228e613f0ef2a58b9782d7c0ea8f1e58b <e5576641b79ecd36acaf91fec4a5333b1ad19c57
- Affected versionversion=5a5e9c0228e613f0ef2a58b9782d7c0ea8f1e58b <f5376d7e0fb703876199d3b6f9f97e128fa2f8a4
- Affected versionversion=6.19
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Published CVSS scores
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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.
Activity data is delayed. The latest report is Sep 28, 2026.
Weakness, pattern, technique
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Public exploit references
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Technologies
Your stack
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