CVE-2026-68416

mtd: fix double free and WARN_ON in add_mtd_device() error paths

State
Published
Severity
Not scored
Published
Aug 10, 2026
Updated
Oct 30, 2026
Reserved
Jul 30, 2026

Read the record on cve.org

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

mtd: fix double free and WARN_ON in add_mtd_device() error paths

When device_register() or mtd_nvmem_add() fails inside add_mtd_device() for a partition, the error handling triggers mtd_release() via put_device() or device_unregister(). mtd_release() calls release_mtd_partition() which frees the mtd_info structure. However, callers such as mtd_add_partition() and add_mtd_partitions() also call free_partition() in their error paths, resulting in a double free.

Additionally, release_mtd_partition() hits WARN_ON(!list_empty( &mtd->part.node)) because the partition node is still linked in the parent's partitions list when the release callback fires from the add_mtd_device() error path.

Fix this by overriding dev->type and dev->release before put_device() in the error paths, so that device_release() invokes a no-op function instead of mtd_release(). For the mtd_nvmem_add() failure case, device_unregister() is replaced with device_del() to separate the device removal from the final kobject reference drop, allowing the override to take effect before put_device() is called.

The callers' error paths (list_del + free_partition) remain the sole owners of mtd_info lifetime on add_mtd_device() failure, which is the expected contract.

The normal partition teardown path is not affected: del_mtd_device() goes through kref_put() -> mtd_device_release() -> device_unregister() with dev->type still set to &mtd_devtype, so mtd_release() -> release_mtd_partition() continues to work correctly for the regular removal case.

Scores

The record has no CVSS score.

Weaknesses

The record names no weakness.

Affected Products

ProductVersions
LinuxLinux
  • 93c08951d7070134b7415ca4abd0d25876aa653b to before b1f78dc4a6869e30ff64345a5d3e7da1b6da0061Affected
  • 006764e33fe9cff72f8a68ce1dab570d93662c96 to before 1dfe90daee6080b088b65620ff690a56f59ddea2Affected
  • 19bfa9ebebb5ec0695def57eb1d80de7e9cab369 to before ffe21a3545b439e7b11578a701c22a847c149561Affected
  • 19bfa9ebebb5ec0695def57eb1d80de7e9cab369 to before e1e96aca1bdf391e2f49531c270ffc134e5b49a5Affected
  • 19bfa9ebebb5ec0695def57eb1d80de7e9cab369 to before f98ae09c727dcf34f745c875661c64b642e4abfaAffected
  • 19bfa9ebebb5ec0695def57eb1d80de7e9cab369 to before 820f983d641937a787e841ee4b93501f69f5683eAffected
  • 19bfa9ebebb5ec0695def57eb1d80de7e9cab369 to before 9d4af746af8ce27eefc2338b2feaa1e01f28b6c3Affected
LinuxLinux
  • 6.6Affected
  • before 6.6Not affected
  • 6.6.148 through 6.6.*Not affected
  • 6.12.101 through 6.12.*Not affected
  • 6.18.42 through 6.18.*Not affected
  • 7.1.6 through 7.1.*Not affected
  • 7.2 and laterNot affected

References

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