CVE-2026-74691

What the bug is

tbnet_tear_down() stops both rings and frees their frame buffers before calling tb_xdomain_disable_paths(). tb_ring_stop() zeroes the ring's descriptor base and tbnet_free_buffers() unmaps and frees the pages the frames sit in, so by the time __tb_path_deactivate_hop() polls the hop's 'pending' bit, anything still in flight has nowhere to drain to. The teardown sequence has been in this order since the driver was added. The setup path has not: commit ff7cd07f3064 ("net: thunderbolt: Enable DMA paths only after rings are enabled") moved the path enable to the end of tbnet_connected_work() and documented why: /* Both logins successful so enable the rings, high-speed DMA * paths and start the network device queue. * * Note we enable the DMA paths last to make sure we have primed * the Rx ring before any incoming packets are allowed to * arrive. */ Teardown was never updated to match, so the rings and the paths now come down in the same order they go up instead of in reverse. On an ASMedia ASM4242 host router the 'pending' bit then never clears: every teardown burns the full 500 ms timeout and __tb_path_deactivate_hop() returns -ETIMEDOUT. Raising the timeout to 5 s does not help, so the hop is not slow to drain, it never drains at all. The failure is invisible above the thunderbolt core. __tb_path_deactivate_hops() is void and only calls tb_port_warn(); tb_path_deactivate(), tb_tunnel_deactivate() and __tb_disconnect_xdomain_paths() are void as well, and tb_disconnect_xdomain_paths() ends in an unconditional "return 0". So tb_xdomain_disable_paths() reports success and the netdev_warn() below it never fires. Repeated teardowns eventually take the XDomain control channel down, after which the peer node is gone and only a power cycle brings the controller back. Deactivating the paths first fixes it. Measured with kretprobes on a stock v6.17 tree with no other patches applied, on a link that was up and had just carried traffic: before: __tb_path_deactivate_hop() returns 0 for the first hop, then -ETIMEDOUT for the second 500335 us later after: 0 for both, 525 us apart Alternating the two orderings ABBA over three load levels, four teardowns per arm: every teardown failed before the change (21 of 21 that ran), none failed after (0 of 24). The before arms ran short because the link died partway through. The same split shows up when the interface is enslaved to a bond instead of just brought down, which is how I ran into this in the first place. Throughput and latency after the change are unchanged. Hosts whose routers drain the hop despite the stale descriptor base see no functional difference, since the paths end up deactivated either way.

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.

drivers/net/thunderbolt/main.c

What this is

THUNDERBOLT NETWORK DRIVERMAINTAINERS section matched on drivers/net/thunderbolt/ · netdev@vger.kernel.org · Maintained

Kernel module

thunderbolt_net

Check it on the machine

grep -w CONFIG_USB4_NET /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 thunderbolt_net

Prints 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. The build rule could not be established for 1 release, so nothing is claimed about those.

• bookworm?
• trixieMnot built on amd64/cloud-amd64, arm64/arm64, arm64/arm64-16k, arm64/cloud-arm64, arm64/rt/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/arm64, arm64/arm64-16k, arm64/cloud-arm64, arm64/rt-arm64, armhf/armmp, armhf/armmp-lpae, loong64/loong64, ppc64el/powerpc64le, ppc64el/powerpc64le-64k, riscv64/riscv64, s390x/s390x
• bookworm · linux-6.12Mnot built on amd64/cloud-amd64, arm64/arm64, arm64/arm64-16k, arm64/cloud-arm64, arm64/rt/arm64, armhf/armmp, armhf/armmp-lpae, armhf/rt/armmp, ppc64el/powerpc64le, ppc64el/powerpc64le-64k

?

not established - no Makefile entry for the affected file

M

a module where it is built at all; some flavours do not build it

Where a release above reads "not established", no build rule for the affected file was found in that release's kernel tree. That is a gap in this lookup, not a finding that the code is absent.

Build switch

CONFIG_USB4_NET

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

2026-08-22 (2 months ago)source

CVSS

8.8 high
CVSS:3.1/AV:A/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:Hsource recompute it

Attack vector

adjacent network (AV:A)source

EPSS

0.26%, higher than 16.1% of all CVEssource

CISA KEV

not listedthe KEV catalogue

Debian urgency

not yet assignedsource

Subsystem

drivers/net

Upstream fixes

The versions the CNA records as introducing and fixing this, and the commit for each. source

Introduced	Fixed in	Commit
4.15	5.15.216	7cce39109206
4.15	6.1.183	0da9a6d27155
4.15	6.6.152	b5a21615f627
4.15	6.12.104	103a9b663ac1
4.15	6.18.45	4dd71cb0d23d
4.15	7.1.9	9a482b2b117e
4.15	7.2	68bf02b6b4ad

Debian advisories