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CVE-2026-72303
ASoC: SOF: ipc4-control: Validate notification payload size
Published 2026-08-15 (2 months ago) by the Linux kernel CNA. Subsystem sound/soc. Debian urgency: unimportant.
What to do, per Debian release
Debian's own status for CVE-2026-72303 in every release this site tracks, and what each one means in practice. Every status below is the one the Debian Security Team publishes for this CVE. source
| Release | Status | Version | What this means |
|---|---|---|---|
| Debian 12bookworm | not affected | 6.1.190-1 | Nothing to do. bookworm never shipped the vulnerable code. |
| Debian 13trixie | not affected | 6.12.113-1 | Nothing to do. trixie never shipped the vulnerable code. |
| Debian 14forky | fixed | 7.1.5-1 | Update the kernel and reboot. Fixed in 7.1.5-1. A running kernel keeps the old code until the machine restarts. |
| Debian unstablesid | fixed | 7.1.5-1 | Update the kernel and reboot. Fixed in 7.1.5-1. A running kernel keeps the old code until the machine restarts. |
The vulnerability
What the bug is
Validate MODULE_NOTIFICATION payload length before reading bytes/channel data in control update handling.
Where it lives
The fix touches these files. If the subsystem is one you do not use, the practical exposure is lower, though the package is still the vulnerable one.
sound/soc/sof/ipc4-control.c
- What this is
- SOUND - SOUND OPEN FIRMWARE (SOF) DRIVERSMAINTAINERS section matched on sound/soc/sof/ · sound-open-firmware@alsa-project.org · Supported
- Kernel module
- snd_sof
Check it on the machine
grep -wE 'CONFIG_SND|CONFIG_SND_SOC|CONFIG_SND_SOC_SOF' /boot/config-$(uname -r)Reads the booted kernel's own configuration, on the machine and nowhere else. =y is built in, =m is a module, and an is not set line means the code is not there.
lsmod | grep -w snd_sofPrints a line if that module is loaded right now, and nothing if it is not. One that is not loaded can still be loaded later by anything that needs it.
Show whether Debian builds this, per release
Debian builds this, but not on every flavour. At least one release below builds the code on some of its kernel flavours and not on others, so the answer depends on the architecture and flavour installed.
- bookwormMnot built on amd64/cloud-amd64, arm64/arm64, arm64/cloud-arm64, arm64/rt/arm64, armhf/armmp, armhf/armmp-lpae, armhf/rt/armmp, ppc64el/powerpc64le
- trixieMnot built on amd64/cloud-amd64, arm64/cloud-arm64, armel/rpi, armhf/armmp, armhf/armmp-lpae, armhf/rt/armmp, ppc64el/powerpc64le, ppc64el/powerpc64le-64k, riscv64/riscv64, s390x/s390x
- forky, sidMnot built on amd64/cloud-amd64, arm64/cloud-arm64, armhf/armmp, armhf/armmp-lpae, loong64/loong64, ppc64el/powerpc64le, ppc64el/powerpc64le-64k, riscv64/riscv64, s390x/s390x
- M
- a module where it is built at all; some flavours do not build it
- Build switches
- CONFIG_SND, CONFIG_SND_SOC, CONFIG_SND_SOC_SOF
- Reads as
- all on means the file is compiled; any one off means it is not.
From the configuration Debian publishes for every kernel flavour it builds. It covers only the architectures Debian ships a linux-config package for, and nothing about a kernel you built yourself. Debian's own status above stays authoritative about the source package.MAINTAINERS kbuild Makefiles Debian linux-config packages
Signals
- Published
- 2026-08-15 (2 months ago)source
- CVSS
- 7.8 high
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:Hsource recompute it - Attack vector
- local (AV:L)source
- EPSS
- 0.17%, higher than 5.4% of all CVEssource
- CISA KEV
- not listedthe KEV catalogue
- Debian urgency
- unimportantsource
- Subsystem
- sound/soc
Upstream fixes
The versions the CNA records as introducing and fixing this, and the commit for each. source
| Introduced | Fixed in | Commit |
|---|---|---|
| 7.0 | 7.1.5 | c29f5b449889 |
| 7.0 | 7.2 | 5bdfeccb7fbf |
Why the CNA scored it this way
Quoted from the kernel CNA's own scoring file, word for word. A highlighted metric carries the most severe value CVSS v3.1 defines for it, which is what pushes the score up. source
- AV:LAttack vector, local
- The flaw is reached when the on-chip SOF DSP delivers IPC4 MODULE_NOTIFICATION messages to the host via mailbox/IRQ; exploitation requires local access to a SOF-equipped system using the ALSA control interface, not remote network delivery.
- AC:LAttack complexity, low
- A local attacker can repeatedly issue ALSA control ioctls that cause the DSP to emit control-change notifications; no race or victim state beyond attacker-driven audio IPC is needed to supply inconsistent num_elems versus event_data_size.
- PR:LPrivileges required, low
- Only an unprivileged local user able to open ALSA control devices on SOF hardware (typical on Intel laptop/desktop audio stacks) is required; root or init-namespace capabilities are not needed to drive the vulnerable notification path.
- UI:NUser interaction, none
- No action by a separate victim is required; the attacker triggers DSP notifications through their own ALSA control operations and the kernel processes malformed firmware payloads automatically.
- S:UScope, unchanged
- Impact stays within the host kernel audio subsystem on the same machine; heap disclosure or control-cache corruption does not cross VM, container, or IOMMU boundaries into another security authority.
- C:HConfidentiality impact, high
- Missing payload-length validation lets num_elems drive memcpy and chanv parsing beyond the kmalloc IPC notification buffer, causing out-of-bounds kernel heap reads that can disclose adjacent memory contents.
- I:HIntegrity impact, high
- Untrusted num_elems values cause kernel memory corruption by copying out-of-bounds firmware/heap bytes into control caches via memcpy and chanv updates, providing bounded but attacker-influenced kernel writes usable in further exploitation.
- A:HAvailability impact, high
- Large num_elems values trigger extensive out-of-bounds accesses during IRQ-threaded IPC notification handling, which can provoke KASAN faults, unhandled page faults, kernel oops, or panic under realistic SOF workloads.