Look up another CVE · open CVE-2026-74711 in the interactive tracker
CVE-2026-74711
hwmon: (pmbus) Fix type confusion in notification logic
Published 2026-08-22 (2 months ago) by the Linux kernel CNA. Subsystem drivers/hwmon. Debian urgency: unimportant.
What to do, per Debian release
Debian's own status for CVE-2026-74711 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 | vulnerable | 6.12.113-1 | No fix published anywhere yet, neither in Debian nor upstream for the series trixie tracks. Watch the Debian tracker page for this CVE. Advisories for trixie have historically landed a median of 11 days after publication. |
| Debian 14forky | fixed | 7.1.9-1 | Update the kernel and reboot. Fixed in 7.1.9-1. A running kernel keeps the old code until the machine restarts. |
| Debian unstablesid | fixed | 7.1.9-1 | Update the kernel and reboot. Fixed in 7.1.9-1. A running kernel keeps the old code until the machine restarts. |
The vulnerability
What the bug is
Sashiko reports: At the start of the loop in pmbus_notify(), the code unconditionally casts every attribute to a struct sensor_device_attribute: drivers/hwmon/pmbus/pmbus_core.c:pmbus_notify() { for (i = 0; i < data->num_attributes; i++) { struct device_attribute *da = to_dev_attr(data->group.attrs[i]); struct sensor_device_attribute *attr = to_sensor_dev_attr(da); int index = attr->index; ... } However, data->group.attrs can contain other types like struct pmbus_samples_reg or struct pmbus_sensor, which only embed a base struct device_attribute. If da is a struct pmbus_samples_reg, dev_attr is the last member. Casting it to struct sensor_device_attribute and reading the index field appears to access memory past the end of the allocation, which might trigger a slab-out-of-bounds read. Additionally, if da is a struct pmbus_sensor, casting it causes the index field to overlap with the page, phase, and reg fields. Could this produce a garbage mask on little-endian systems that spuriously matches the target reg, page, and flags during an alert? Fix the problem by using struct sensor_device_attr in struct pmbus_sensor and struct pmbus_label. Since those attributes never trigger a notification, set the value of attr->index to -1 for them. Use this value to distinguish from boolean attributes which _can_ trigger a notification and use the index field to encode mask, page, and register values.
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/hwmon/pmbus/pmbus_core.c
- What this is
- HARDWARE MONITORINGMAINTAINERS section matched on drivers/hwmon/ · linux-hwmon@vger.kernel.org · Maintained
- Kernel module
- pmbus_core
Check it on the machine
grep -wE 'CONFIG_HWMON|CONFIG_PMBUS' /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 pmbus_corePrints 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/amd64, amd64/cloud-amd64, amd64/rt/amd64, arm64/arm64, arm64/cloud-arm64, arm64/rt/arm64, i386/686, i386/686-pae, i386/rt/686-pae, ppc64el/powerpc64le
- trixie, forky, sidMnot built on amd64/cloud-amd64, arm64/cloud-arm64
- M
- a module where it is built at all; some flavours do not build it
- Build switches
- CONFIG_HWMON, CONFIG_PMBUS
- 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
- 2026-08-22 (2 months ago)source
- CVSS
- 8.4 high
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:Hsource recompute it - Attack vector
- local (AV:L)source
- EPSS
- 0.19%, higher than 8.4% of all CVEssource
- CISA KEV
- not listedthe KEV catalogue
- Debian urgency
- unimportantsource
- Subsystem
- drivers/hwmon
Upstream fixes
The versions the CNA records as introducing and fixing this, and the commit for each. source
| Introduced | Fixed in | Commit |
|---|---|---|
| 6.4 | 6.18.45 | 821f6416e697 |
| 6.4 | 7.1.9 | 0b121de89a99 |
| 6.4 | 7.2 | 59bd68ab05a8 |
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 flawed pmbus_notify() runs only in the PMBus SMBALERT threaded IRQ handler after the host kernel reads fault status from an on-board I2C/SMBus PSU/PMIC; reaching it requires local presence on a system exposing that bus, not a remote network protocol.
- AC:LAttack complexity, low
- Once SMBALERT IRQ handling is enabled, the type confusion and slab out-of-bounds read occur deterministically on every alert while iterating attributes; an attacker can repeatedly provoke PSU/PMIC faults (e.g., sustained CPU/GPU load) rather than depend on uncontrollable timing.
- PR:NPrivileges required, none
- No special kernel capability is needed to hit the IRQ path—any unprivileged local process that can drive hardware into an overcurrent/overtemp fault (cloud tenant, factory HMI user, embedded service account) can cause SMBALERT and exercise the bug.
- UI:NUser interaction, none
- Exploitation is driven by attacker-induced or naturally occurring PMBus fault interrupts and does not require any victim to open files, click prompts, or perform other interactive actions.
- S:UScope, unchanged
- Impact is confined to kernel memory safety within the host OS security authority; it is not a VM escape, IOMMU/DMA boundary bypass, or other cross-authority compromise.
- C:HConfidentiality impact, high
- Casting pmbus_samples_reg device attributes to sensor_device_attribute reads attr->index past the object end (slab out-of-bounds), and pmbus_sensor casts reinterpret adjacent page/phase/reg bytes as an index, enabling kernel heap metadata or pointer disclosure.
- I:HIntegrity impact, high
- This is a type confusion in kernel notification logic: mis-decoded indices can spuriously satisfy reg/page/mask checks and drive sysfs_notify/uevent on unintended attributes, a memory-safety defect with potential for further corruption primitives.
- A:HAvailability impact, high
- The out-of-bounds slab read and malformed attribute matching in interrupt context can trigger KASAN/BUG faults or kernel oops/panic when alerts fire on production systems with PMBus SMBALERT wired.