ZephyrProject Zephyr up to 4.4.1 IPv6 Neighbor Discovery subsys/net/ip/ipv6_nbr.c net_ipv6_send_ns allocation of resources

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability identified as critical has been detected in ZephyrProject Zephyr up to 4.4.1. This affects the function net_ipv6_send_ns of the file subsys/net/ip/ipv6_nbr.c of the component IPv6 Neighbor Discovery. The manipulation leads to allocation of resources. This vulnerability is uniquely identified as CVE-2026-14697. The attack is possible to be carried out remotely. No exploit exists.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability was found in ZephyrProject Zephyr up to 4.4.1 and classified as critical. This issue affects the function net_ipv6_send_ns of the file subsys/net/ip/ipv6_nbr.c of the component IPv6 Neighbor Discovery. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a allocation of resources vulnerability. Using CWE to declare the problem leads to CWE-770. The product allocates a reusable resource or group of resources on behalf of an actor without imposing any restrictions on the size or number of resources that can be allocated, in violation of the intended security policy for that actor. Impacted is availability. The summary by CVE is:

net_ipv6_send_ns() in subsys/net/ip/ipv6_nbr.c allocates a transmit net_pkt for a Neighbor Solicitation. When it is called with a data packet pending on an unresolved neighbor and that neighbor's pending_queue is already non-empty (an NS is already outstanding), the function appends the data packet and returns early without ever sending the NS via net_send_data() or releasing it with net_pkt_unref(). The freshly allocated NS net_pkt and its attached TX buffers are held only by a local variable and are leaked permanently, never returning to CONFIG_NET_PKT_TX_COUNT / CONFIG_NET_BUF_TX_COUNT. The leaking branch sits on the normal IPv6 transmit path: net_ipv6_prepare_for_send() (called from net_if.c) invokes net_ipv6_send_ns() for any outbound or forwarded IPv6 packet whose next hop is not yet in the neighbor cache. An on-link (adjacent) attacker can drive it deterministically by sending a burst of request packets (for example ICMPv6 echo requests or UDP datagrams) that all spoof a single non-existent on-link source address: the node generates a reply to each, the first reply queues an NS, and every subsequent reply during the roughly three-second INCOMPLETE resolution window takes the leaking branch and loses one TX packet. Router-configured nodes forwarding attacker traffic toward a non-existent on-link host leak identically. Because the leaked packets are never reclaimed and CONFIG_NET_PKT_TX_COUNT defaults to only 4 (14 for Ethernet), a brief low-rate burst exhausts the TX pool. Once exhausted the node can no longer allocate any transmit packet and cannot send TCP/UDP, ARP/ND, or any reply at all, producing a complete and persistent network denial of service that does not self-heal until reboot. The fix releases the unsent NS packet with net_pkt_unref(pkt) before the early return.

It is possible to read the advisory at github.com. The identification of this vulnerability is CVE-2026-14697 since 07/04/2026. The exploitation is known to be easy. The attack may be initiated remotely. No form of authentication is needed for a successful exploitation. Technical details of the vulnerability are known, but there is no available exploit. The attack technique deployed by this issue is T1499 according to MITRE ATT&CK.

Upgrading to version 4.4.2 eliminates this vulnerability. Applying the patch ab2670e8b5b8fcde4a699dd5cbe452abbd233289 is able to eliminate this problem.

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Productinfo

Type

• Project Management Software

Vendor

• ZephyrProject

Name

• Zephyr

Version

• 4.4.0
• 4.4.1

CPE 2.3info

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CPE 2.2info

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