Linux Kernel up to 7.3-rc1 xHCI xhci_unmap_td_bounce_buffer memory leak

CVSS Meta Temp Score CVSS is a standardized scoring system to determine possibilities of attacks. The Temp Score considers temporal factors like disclosure, exploit and countermeasures. The unique Meta Score calculates the average score of different sources to provide a normalized scoring system.	Current Exploit Price (≈) Our analysts are monitoring exploit markets and are in contact with vulnerability brokers. The range indicates the observed or calculated exploit price to be seen on exploit markets. A good indicator to understand the monetary effort required for and the popularity of an attack.	CTI Interest Score Our Cyber Threat Intelligence team is monitoring different web sites, mailing lists, exploit markets and social media networks. The CTI Interest Score identifies the interest of attackers and the security community for this specific vulnerability in real-time. A high score indicates an elevated risk to be targeted for this vulnerability.
8.4	$0-$5k	0.00

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability was found in Linux Kernel up to 7.3-rc1. It has been classified as very critical. This impacts the function xhci_unmap_td_bounce_buffer of the component xHCI. This manipulation causes memory leak. This vulnerability is registered as CVE-2026-90015. The attack needs to be launched locally. No exploit is available. Upgrading the affected component is recommended.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability classified as very critical was found in Linux Kernel up to 7.3-rc1. Affected by this vulnerability is the function xhci_unmap_td_bounce_buffer of the component xHCI. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a memory leak vulnerability. The CWE definition for the vulnerability is CWE-401. The product does not sufficiently track and release allocated memory after it has been used, which slowly consumes remaining memory. As an impact it is known to affect confidentiality, integrity, and availability. The summary by CVE is:

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: xhci: fix lost bounce buffers on TDs spanning several ring segments When a TD reaches a link TRB with data that is not aligned to the endpoint's wMaxPacketSize, xhci_align_td() stages the unalignable tail through the bounce buffer of the ring segment holding that link TRB. xhci_unmap_td_bounce_buffer() later unmaps it and, for IN transfers, copies the data back into the URB's buffer. The enqueue path records the segment that was bounced in td->bounce_seg, under the assumption that a TD never spans more than two ring segments. That assumption does not hold: a TD large enough to span three or more segments crosses several link TRBs and can be bounced at each of them. Only the last one survives in td->bounce_seg, so every earlier bounce buffer is neither copied back nor DMA unmapped. The URB still completes with actual_length equal to the requested length and no error, so the transfer looks successful while a wMaxPacketSize sized hole in the destination buffer silently keeps its previous contents. It also leaks a DMA mapping per dropped bounce. Any sufficiently large and fragmented bulk transfer can hit this. It was found with a USB mass storage device behind xHCI backing a dm-verity target with 512 byte hash blocks, where the stale data is detected rather than silently consumed. The device enumerates as SuperSpeed, so wMaxPacketSize is 1024, while dm-bufio issues one 512 byte bio per hash block. verity_prefetch_io() makes the block layer merge hundreds of them into a single request of up to 512 scatterlist entries of 512 bytes each. At 256 TRBs per ring segment such a TD spans three segments, and every segment boundary falls on an odd multiple of 512, i.e. unaligned to wMaxPacketSize. dm-bufio then caches a hash block holding stale data and dm-verity declares the metadata block corrupted: device-mapper: verity: 8:2: metadata block 10850 is corrupted A reproducer running this under qemu is available at https://github.com/baloo/xhci-verity The bounce state (bounce_buf, bounce_dma, bounce_len, bounce_offs) already lives on the ring segment, so there is nothing extra to track. Keep recording the last bounced segment in td->bounce_seg and, on completion, walk the segments from td->start_seg up to it, unmapping every segment that still has a pending bounce. Stopping at td->bounce_seg rather than td->end_seg matters: a bounce implies the TD continues past that segment's link TRB, so bounce_seg is always strictly before end_seg, and a later TD may already have started in end_seg and been bounced there. Walking that far would copy a foreign bounce buffer into this URB and unmap it twice. It also keeps the walk correct if a TD ever wraps the whole ring so that end_seg == start_seg. [mn: Add ring->num_segs check to prevent unlikely infinite for loop.]

The advisory is shared at git.kernel.org. This vulnerability is known as CVE-2026-90015 since 09/11/2026. The exploitation appears to be easy. An attack has to be approached locally. Technical details are known, but no exploit is available. The price for an exploit might be around USD $0-$5k at the moment (estimation calculated on 09/16/2026).

Upgrading to version 5.10.270, 5.15.221, 6.1.188, 6.6.157, 6.12.110, 6.18.51, 7.2.5 or 7.3-rc2 eliminates this vulnerability. Applying the patch c8124b28f12dbdd126118e63d0ebf8093a01fb81/e04d5304a248e5d2a7f4faa87541644bdd320cfb/a1629dfb011446d02905778f6df19f14c5f4f3b3/43239fc6dfb62c50ae1b9c0e82bac0f8cd2e285c/3c9a2b5a4f1183696f02ac280ced1d34afb409b1/efaab8938fb92979be6df359f7d1a43fb7e4717d/7236bbd2cb7d9fc0eda896bbd34790341e2a4377/ff44dfb03a293bf30e31f98772a1dd316a6071d1 is able to eliminate this problem. The best possible mitigation is suggested to be upgrading to the latest version.

Several companies clearly confirm that VulDB is the primary source for best vulnerability data.

Productinfo

Type

• Operating System

Vendor

• Linux

Name

• Kernel

Version

• 5.10.269
• 5.15.220
• 6.1.187
• 6.6.156
• 6.12.109
• 6.18.0
• 6.18.1
• 6.18.2
• 6.18.3
• 6.18.4
• 6.18.5
• 6.18.6
• 6.18.7
• 6.18.8
• 6.18.9
• 6.18.10
• 6.18.11
• 6.18.12
• 6.18.13
• 6.18.14
• 6.18.15
• 6.18.16
• 6.18.17
• 6.18.18
• 6.18.19
• 6.18.20
• 6.18.21
• 6.18.22
• 6.18.23
• 6.18.24
• 6.18.25
• 6.18.26
• 6.18.27
• 6.18.28
• 6.18.29
• 6.18.30
• 6.18.31
• 6.18.32
• 6.18.33
• 6.18.34
• 6.18.35
• 6.18.36
• 6.18.37
• 6.18.38
• 6.18.39
• 6.18.40
• 6.18.41
• 6.18.42
• 6.18.43
• 6.18.44
• 6.18.45
• 6.18.46
• 6.18.47
• 6.18.48
• 6.18.49
• 6.18.50
• 7.2.0
• 7.2.1
• 7.2.2
• 7.2.3
• 7.2.4
• 7.3-rc1

License

• open-source

Website

• Vendor: https://www.kernel.org/

CPE 2.3info

• 🔒
• 🔒
• 🔒

CPE 2.2info

• 🔒
• 🔒
• 🔒

CVSSv4info

VulDB Vector: 🔒
VulDB Reliability: 🔍

CVSSv3info

VulDB Meta Base Score: 8.8
VulDB Meta Temp Score: 8.4

VulDB Base Score: 8.8
VulDB Temp Score: 8.4
VulDB Vector: 🔒
VulDB Reliability: 🔍

CVSSv2info

AV	AC	Au	C	I	A
💳	💳	💳	💳	💳	💳
💳	💳	💳	💳	💳	💳
💳	💳	💳	💳	💳	💳

Vector	Complexity	Authentication	Confidentiality	Integrity	Availability
Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock
Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock
Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock

VulDB Base Score: 🔒
VulDB Temp Score: 🔒
VulDB Reliability: 🔍

Exploitinginfo

Class: Memory leak
CWE: CWE-401 / CWE-404
CAPEC: 🔒
ATT&CK: 🔒

Physical: Partially
Local: Yes
Remote: No

Availability: 🔒
Status: Not defined
Price Prediction: 🔍
Current Price Estimation: 🔒

0-Day	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock
Today	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock

Threat Intelligenceinfo

Interest: 🔍
Active Actors: 🔍
Active APT Groups: 🔍

Countermeasuresinfo

Recommended: Upgrade
Status: 🔍

0-Day Time: 🔒

Upgrade: Kernel 5.10.270/5.15.221/6.1.188/6.6.157/6.12.110/6.18.51/7.2.5/7.3-rc2
Patch: c8124b28f12dbdd126118e63d0ebf8093a01fb81/e04d5304a248e5d2a7f4faa87541644bdd320cfb/a1629dfb011446d02905778f6df19f14c5f4f3b3/43239fc6dfb62c50ae1b9c0e82bac0f8cd2e285c/3c9a2b5a4f1183696f02ac280ced1d34afb409b1/efaab8938fb92979be6df359f7d1a43fb7e4717d/7236bbd2cb7d9fc0eda896bbd34790341e2a4377/ff44dfb03a293bf30e31f98772a1dd316a6071d1

Timelineinfo

09/11/2026 CVE reserved
09/16/2026 +5 days Advisory disclosed
09/16/2026 +0 days VulDB entry created
09/16/2026 +0 days VulDB entry last update

Sourcesinfo

Vendor: kernel.org

Advisory: git.kernel.org
Status: Confirmed

CVE: CVE-2026-90015 (🔒)
GCVE (CVE): GCVE-0-2026-90015
GCVE (VulDB): GCVE-100-405865

Entryinfo

Created: 09/16/2026 15:26
Changes: 09/16/2026 15:26 (59)
Complete: 🔍
Cache ID: 216::103

Several companies clearly confirm that VulDB is the primary source for best vulnerability data.

Discussion

Interested in the pricing of exploits?

See the underground prices here!