What is CVE-2026-98008?

CVE-2026-98008 is a unscored severity Linux kernel vulnerability, affecting Linux kernel versions from 6.1.114 onward and patched in 6.1.189, 6.6.158, 6.12.111 and others. CVE-2026-98008 has not been confirmed as actively exploited and is not listed in the CISA KEV catalog.

What is the CVSS score for CVE-2026-98008?

CVE-2026-98008 has a CVSS score of pending NVD analysis out of 10, rated awaiting scoring severity.

Is there a patch available for CVE-2026-98008?

Yes, CVE-2026-98008 has been patched. Fixed versions include 6.1.189, 6.6.158, 6.12.111 and others. If you are running Linux kernel 6.1.114 or later up to the fix versions, apply the relevant patch for your kernel branch.

Is CVE-2026-98008 actively exploited?

CVE-2026-98008 has not been confirmed as actively exploited and is not listed in the CISA KEV catalog.

CVE-2026-98008

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net: macb: fix NULL pointer dereference on unbind with fixed-link When the device tree describes a fixed-link and has no "mdio" child node, macb_mii_init() returns early without allocating the MDIO bus, leaving bp->mii_bus as NULL. Two cleanup paths then dereference this NULL bus: 1. On driver unbind, macb_remove() unconditionally calls mdiobus_unregister(bp->mii_bus), which oopses: Unable to handle kernel NULL pointer dereference at virtual address 00000000000004a8 pc : mdiobus_unregister+0x14/0xa4 lr : macb_remove+0x38/0xa4 Call trace: mdiobus_unregister+0x14/0xa4 (P) macb_remove+0x38/0xa4 platform_remove+0x20/0x30 device_release_driver_internal+0x1c8/0x224 unbind_store+0xb4/0xbc 2. On the probe error path in macb_probe(), reached when macb_mii_init() has succeeded but a subsequent step fails, the err_out_unregister_mdio label runs the same unconditional cleanup. mdiobus_unregister() and mdiobus_free() do not guard against a NULL bus, so guard the calls in both macb_remove() and the probe error path.

Package Linux Kernel

Published 2026-09-25

Last modified 2026-10-03

Patch available

Yes

Affected versions

Linux kernel versions 6.1.114, 6.6.58, 5.10.228, 5.15.169, 6.11.5, 6.12 and later are affected. Fixed in 6.1.189, 6.6.158, 6.12.111, 6.18.53, 7.2.7, 7.3-rc3 and their respective stable series.

Affected from

≥ 6.1.114 ≥ 6.6.58 ≥ 5.10.228 ≥ 5.15.169 ≥ 6.11.5 ≥ 6.12

Fixed in

✓ 6.1.189 6.1.x ✓ 6.6.158 6.6.x ✓ 6.12.111 6.12.x ✓ 6.18.53 6.18.x ✓ 7.2.7 7.2.x ✓ 7.3-rc3

References

6 total

Showing 5 of 6 references View all on NVD

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2026-98008?

CVE-2026-98008 is a unscored severity Linux kernel vulnerability . It affects Linux kernel versions from 6.1.114 onward and has been patched in 6.1.189, 6.6.158, 6.12.111 and others. CVE-2026-98008 has not been confirmed as actively exploited and is not listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
Is there a patch available for CVE-2026-98008?

Yes. CVE-2026-98008 has been patched. Fixed versions include 6.1.189, 6.6.158, 6.12.111 and others. If you are running Linux kernel 6.1.114 or later up to the fix versions, apply the relevant patch for your kernel branch.
Is CVE-2026-98008 actively exploited?

No. CVE-2026-98008 has not been confirmed as actively exploited. It is not listed in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog.