CVE-2026-23069: vsock/virtio: fix potential underflow in virtio_transport_get_credit()

Vulnerability summary

CVE-2026-23069 is a medium (CVSS 5.5) Integer Underflow (Wrap or Wraparound) vulnerability in linux. EPSS estimates a 0.18% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 7.5% of scored vulnerabilities.

Timeline

1. 04-02-2026
   PublishedVulnerability first disclosed.
2. 19-10-2026
   Last modifiedVulnerability information updated.

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: vsock/virtio: fix potential underflow in virtio_transport_get_credit() The credit calculation in virtio_transport_get_credit() uses unsigned arithmetic: ret = vvs->peer_buf_alloc - (vvs->tx_cnt - vvs->peer_fwd_cnt); If the peer shrinks its advertised buffer (peer_buf_alloc) while bytes are in flight, the subtraction can underflow and produce a large positive value, potentially allowing more data to be queued than the peer can handle. Reuse virtio_transport_has_space() which already handles this case and add a comment to make it clear why we are doing that. [Stefano: use virtio_transport_has_space() instead of duplicating the code] [Stefano: tweak the commit message]

• CWE-191Integer Underflow (Wrap or Wraparound)The product subtracts one value from another, such that the result is less than the minimum allowable integer value, which produces a value that is not equal to the correct result.
• CWE-190Integer Overflow or WraparoundThe product performs a calculation that can produce an integer overflow or wraparound when the logic assumes that the resulting value will always be larger than the original value. This occurs when an integer value is incremented to a value that is too large to store in the associated representation. When this occurs, the value may become a very small or negative number.