Linux Kernel up to 7.2.4 wave5 send_firmware_command race condition

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability was found in Linux Kernel up to 7.2.4. It has been rated as critical. This affects the function send_firmware_command of the component wave5. Performing a manipulation results in race condition. This vulnerability is cataloged as CVE-2026-89866. It is possible to initiate the attack remotely. There is no exploit available. Upgrading the affected component is advised.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability was found in Linux Kernel up to 7.2.4. It has been classified as critical. This affects the function send_firmware_command of the component wave5. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a race condition vulnerability. CWE is classifying the issue as CWE-362. The product contains a code sequence that can run concurrently with other code, and the code sequence requires temporary, exclusive access to a shared resource, but a timing window exists in which the shared resource can be modified by another code sequence that is operating concurrently. This is going to have an impact on availability. The summary by CVE is:

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: media: chips-media: wave5: Resume device before setting EOS flag Setting the EOS flag talks to the firmware via send_firmware_command(), which accesses VPU registers. Both the STREAMOFF path (wave5_vpu_dec_job_abort()) and the V4L2_DEC_CMD_STOP path (wave5_vpu_dec_stop()) can run while the device is runtime suspended, so those register accesses hit powered-down hardware and the SoC raises an asynchronous SError, panicking the kernel: SError Interrupt on CPU3, code 0x00000000bf000000 -- SError send_firmware_command+0x2c/0x160 [wave5] wave5_vpu_dec_set_bitstream_flag+0x6c/0x80 [wave5] wave5_vpu_dec_update_bitstream_buffer+0x80/0xec [wave5] wave5_vpu_dec_job_abort+0x44/0xa0 [wave5] v4l2_m2m_cancel_job+0x110/0x19c [v4l2_mem2mem] v4l2_m2m_streamoff+0x24/0x140 [v4l2_mem2mem] Resume the device with pm_runtime_resume_and_get() around the EOS firmware command and release it with pm_runtime_put_autosuspend(), matching the runtime PM handling already done in wave5_vpu_dec_device_run().

It is possible to read the advisory at git.kernel.org. This vulnerability is uniquely identified as CVE-2026-89866 since 09/11/2026. The exploitability is told to be easy. It is possible to initiate the attack remotely. Technical details of the vulnerability are known, but there is no available exploit. The pricing for an exploit might be around USD $0-$5k at the moment (estimation calculated on 09/16/2026).

Upgrading to version 7.2.5 or 7.3-rc1 eliminates this vulnerability. Applying the patch 2215e55ee1e5e69ad53862d968360c5aa63dd3a7/a52e6f7923c17a672135b485ffd96fbd72f46267 is able to eliminate this problem. The best possible mitigation is suggested to be upgrading to the latest version.

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Productinfo

Type

• Operating System

Vendor

• Linux

Name

• Kernel

Version

• 7.2.0
• 7.2.1
• 7.2.2
• 7.2.3
• 7.2.4

License

• open-source

Website

• Vendor: https://www.kernel.org/

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