data built 2026-10-19T13:16:53Z

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CVE-2026-98420

ksmbd: follow SMB2 session expiration semantics

EPSS 0.2%

Published 2026-10-14 (4 days ago) by the Linux kernel CNA. Subsystem fs/smb. Debian urgency: not yet assigned.

What to do, per Debian release

Debian's own status for CVE-2026-98420 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

ReleaseStatus VersionWhat this means
Debian 12bookwormvulnerable6.1.190-1No fix published anywhere yet, neither in Debian nor upstream for the series bookworm tracks. Watch the Debian tracker page for this CVE. Advisories for bookworm have historically landed a median of 23 days after publication.
Debian 13trixievulnerable6.12.113-1No 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 14forkyfixed7.2.8-1Update the kernel and reboot. Fixed in 7.2.8-1. A running kernel keeps the old code until the machine restarts.
Debian unstablesidfixed7.2.8-1Update the kernel and reboot. Fixed in 7.2.8-1. A running kernel keeps the old code until the machine restarts.

The vulnerability

What the bug is

ksmbd_session_register() destroys valid sessions after ten seconds of inactivity whenever a client starts another SessionSetup exchange. This confuses Session.IdleTime with Session.ExpirationTime. Windows can create additional authenticated sessions on an existing connection, so deleting the older session invalidates its tree connects and makes mapped drives fail with STATUS_NETWORK_NAME_DELETED. The session expiration rules require the server to change a valid session to expired only after its credential expiration time passes. A valid or expired session otherwise keeps its connection from being scavenged. Connections that have not negotiated a dialect, have no sessions, or have only InProgress sessions are disconnected after an implementation-specific timeout. Use the Windows-compatible 45 second value and run the expiration check periodically for both TCP and SMB Direct. Keep zero as an infinite credential expiration time, and count each Valid-to-Expired transition. Set expired sessions to InProgress when they reauthenticate. If authentication fails, remove the session from the global and per-connection tables immediately, including SMB3 multichannel connections. Retain protection against abandoned SessionId-zero exchanges by allowing only one InProgress authentication per connection. Additional exchanges fail with STATUS_INSUFFICIENT_RESOURCES, and stale InProgress sessions are reaped after the same 45 second setup timeout. This bounds the original unauthenticated memory-exhaustion path without evicting established sessions.

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.

fs/smb/server/connection.c
fs/smb/server/connection.h
fs/smb/server/mgmt/user_session.c
fs/smb/server/mgmt/user_session.h
fs/smb/server/proc.c
fs/smb/server/server.c
fs/smb/server/smb2pdu.c
fs/smb/server/smb2pdu.h
fs/smb/server/stats.h

What this is
KERNEL SMB3 SERVER (KSMBD)MAINTAINERS section matched on fs/smb/server/ · linux-cifs@vger.kernel.org · Maintained
Kernel module
ksmbd

Check it on the machine

grep -wE 'CONFIG_SMBFS|CONFIG_SMB_SERVER' /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 ksmbd

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 as a loadable module. Every release below compiles it as a module on every flavour, so whether the code is in the running kernel depends on whether that module is loaded.

  • bookworm, trixie, forky, sidm
m
a loadable module on every flavour - check lsmod, can be blacklisted
Build switches
CONFIG_SMBFS, CONFIG_SMB_SERVER
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
2026-10-14 (4 days ago)source
CVSS
no vector published, unrated
Attack vector
not published
EPSS
0.24%, higher than 13.7% of all CVEssource
CISA KEV
not listedthe KEV catalogue
Debian urgency
not yet assignedsource
Subsystem
fs/smb

Upstream fixes

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

IntroducedFixed inCommit
6.47.2.8c99ea7855124
6.47.3d7fd1f98607f
5.15.14500
6.1.2900
6.2.1600
6.3.200

Why the CNA scored it this way

The kernel CNA published no CVSS vector and no reasoning for CVE-2026-98420, which is why it is shown as unrated rather than given an invented score. 6,405 of the 20,413 CVEs here carry reasoning; this is not one of them.