What is CVE-2026-72238?

CVE-2026-72238 is a unscored severity Linux kernel vulnerability, affecting Linux kernel versions from 2.6.36 onward and patched in 5.10.261, 5.15.212, 6.1.178 and others. CVE-2026-72238 has not been confirmed as actively exploited and is not listed in the CISA KEV catalog.

What is the CVSS score for CVE-2026-72238?

CVE-2026-72238 has a CVSS score of pending NVD analysis out of 10, rated awaiting scoring severity.

Is there a patch available for CVE-2026-72238?

Yes, CVE-2026-72238 has been patched. Fixed versions include 5.10.261, 5.15.212, 6.1.178 and others. If you are running Linux kernel 2.6.36 or later up to the fix versions, apply the relevant patch for your kernel branch.

Is CVE-2026-72238 actively exploited?

CVE-2026-72238 has not been confirmed as actively exploited and is not listed in the CISA KEV catalog.

CVE-2026-72238

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: x86/boot: Validate console=uart8250 baud rate to fix early boot hang When the baud rate is empty, 0, invalid, or overflows to 0 when stored as an int, the system will hang during early boot because of a division by zero in early_serial_init(). Fall back to DEFAULT_BAUD when the resulting baud rate is 0 to prevent an early system hang.

Package Linux Kernel

Published 2026-08-15

Last modified 2026-08-15

Patch available

Yes

Affected versions

Linux kernel versions 2.6.36 and later are affected. Fixed in 5.10.261, 5.15.212, 6.1.178, 6.6.145, 6.12.97, 6.18.40, 7.1.5, 7.2-rc4 and their respective stable series.

Affected from

≥ 2.6.36

Fixed in

✓ 5.10.261 5.10.x ✓ 5.15.212 5.15.x ✓ 6.1.178 6.1.x ✓ 6.6.145 6.6.x ✓ 6.12.97 6.12.x ✓ 6.18.40 6.18.x ✓ 7.1.5 7.1.x ✓ 7.2-rc4

References

8 total

Showing 5 of 8 references View all on NVD

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2026-72238?

CVE-2026-72238 is a unscored severity Linux kernel vulnerability . It affects Linux kernel versions from 2.6.36 onward and has been patched in 5.10.261, 5.15.212, 6.1.178 and others. CVE-2026-72238 has not been confirmed as actively exploited and is not listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
Is there a patch available for CVE-2026-72238?

Yes. CVE-2026-72238 has been patched. Fixed versions include 5.10.261, 5.15.212, 6.1.178 and others. If you are running Linux kernel 2.6.36 or later up to the fix versions, apply the relevant patch for your kernel branch.
Is CVE-2026-72238 actively exploited?

No. CVE-2026-72238 has not been confirmed as actively exploited. It is not listed in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog.