Linux Kernel up to 6.12.112/6.18.55/7.2.9/7.3-rc5 USB Serial Driver race condition

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.
7.8	$0-$5k	0.91-

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability, which was classified as very critical, has been found in Linux Kernel up to 6.12.112/6.18.55/7.2.9/7.3-rc5. This issue affects some unknown processing of the component USB Serial Driver. This manipulation causes race condition. This vulnerability is registered as CVE-2026-98697. The attack needs to be launched locally. No exploit is available. It is advisable to upgrade the affected component.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability classified as very critical was found in Linux Kernel up to 6.12.112/6.18.55/7.2.9/7.3-rc5. Affected by this vulnerability is an unknown functionality of the component USB Serial Driver. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a race condition vulnerability. The CWE definition for the vulnerability is 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. 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: USB: serial: fix dynamic id driver deregistration race Only free the dynamic ids after having deregistered the driver and removed the "new_id" attribute to avoid leaking any id added by a racing write to the attribute.

It is possible to read the advisory at git.kernel.org. This vulnerability is known as CVE-2026-98697 since 09/25/2026. The exploitation appears to be easy. Attacking locally is a requirement. The exploitation requires an enhanced level of successful authentication. The technical details are unknown and an exploit is not publicly available. The pricing for an exploit might be around USD $0-$5k at the moment (estimation calculated on 10/18/2026).

Upgrading to version 6.12.113, 6.18.56, 7.2.10 or 7.3-rc6 eliminates this vulnerability. Applying the patch ebd8fcaaacb66c15ae7e19d14619abe3762e0701/4d6da6867b4ac6468d634a0dd3c35dfc0dc8af81/380f57cd58e26e0f3687451196ec446c473c52d9/63594e8ffe097bc0b7639936f33799a7653dded2 is able to eliminate this problem. The best possible mitigation is suggested to be upgrading to the latest version.

Be aware that VulDB is the high quality source for vulnerability data.

Productinfo

Type

• Operating System

Vendor

• Linux

Name

• Kernel

Version

• 6.12.112
• 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
• 6.18.51
• 6.18.52
• 6.18.53
• 6.18.54
• 6.18.55
• 7.2.0
• 7.2.1
• 7.2.2
• 7.2.3
• 7.2.4
• 7.2.5
• 7.2.6
• 7.2.7
• 7.2.8
• 7.2.9
• 7.3-rc1
• 7.3-rc2
• 7.3-rc3
• 7.3-rc4
• 7.3-rc5

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: 8.2
VulDB Meta Temp Score: 7.8

VulDB Base Score: 8.2
VulDB Temp Score: 7.8
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: Race condition
CWE: CWE-362
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 6.12.113/6.18.56/7.2.10/7.3-rc6
Patch: ebd8fcaaacb66c15ae7e19d14619abe3762e0701/4d6da6867b4ac6468d634a0dd3c35dfc0dc8af81/380f57cd58e26e0f3687451196ec446c473c52d9/63594e8ffe097bc0b7639936f33799a7653dded2

Timelineinfo

09/25/2026 CVE reserved
10/18/2026 +23 days Advisory disclosed
10/18/2026 +0 days VulDB entry created
10/18/2026 +0 days VulDB entry last update

Sourcesinfo

Vendor: kernel.org

Advisory: git.kernel.org
Status: Confirmed

CVE: CVE-2026-98697 (🔒)
GCVE (CVE): GCVE-0-2026-98697
GCVE (VulDB): GCVE-100-421975

Entryinfo

Created: 10/18/2026 19:36
Changes: 10/18/2026 19:36 (58)
Complete: 🔍
Cache ID: 216::103

Be aware that VulDB is the high quality source for vulnerability data.

Discussion

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