CVE-2026-53396

nfsd: fix posix_acl leak and ignored error in nfsd4_create_file

HIGH
7.1
CVSS Score
Published: July 19, 2026 at 12:01 PM UTC
Updated: August 17, 2026 at 05:17 AM UTC
1 product affected across 1 vendorLinux Kernel

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Severity
HIGH7.1
Exploit prediction
EPSS 0.4%

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: nfsd: fix posix_acl leak and ignored error in nfsd4_create_file nfsd4_create_file() has two bugs in its ACL handling: The return value of nfsd4_acl_to_attr() is silently discarded. When the NFSv4-to-POSIX ACL conversion fails (e.g., -EINVAL for unsupported ACE types), the file is created without any ACL and the client receives NFS4_OK. This violates RFC 7530/8881 which require the server to reject unsupported attributes on CREATE. When start_creating() fails after ACL attributes have been populated in attrs (either via nfsd4_acl_to_attr or via ownership transfer from open->op_dpacl/op_pacl), the function jumps to out_write which skips nfsd_attrs_free(). The posix_acl allocations are leaked. A client can trigger this repeatedly with OPEN(CREATE), ACL attributes, and an invalid filename (e.g., longer than NAME_MAX). Fix both by capturing the nfsd4_acl_to_attr() return value and by changing the early error paths to jump to out instead of out_write. Initialize child to ERR_PTR(-EINVAL) so that end_creating() is safe to call even if start_creating() was never reached.

Affected

Our own answer: ranges merged, affected separated from platform-only, with confidence and review flags.

6.19 ≤ v < 7.1.36.19 ≤ v < 7.26.197ab96df840e60eb933abfe65fc5fe44e72f16dc0
Vendor states this is fixed in 18cf006a08babec0bbac2a3784f8f28e56e47490 (fixed)
Vendor states this is fixed in 24c975bbdd564d7d0ad90294bfa69729830345de (fixed)
Vendor states this is fixed in 6.19 (unaffected)
Vendor states this is fixed in 7.1.3 (unaffected)
Vendor states this is fixed in 7.2 (unaffected)

Remediation

No guide yet

No remediation guidance has been written for this CVE yet. What the record does show:

CVSS

7.1HIGHLinux
Vector?

Quick Info

StatusANALYZED
CWE
CWE-401

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