CVE-2026-64175: wifi: iwlwifi: mld: stop TX during firmware restart
Vulnerability summary
CVE-2026-64175 is a high (CVSS 7.5) Uncontrolled Resource Consumption vulnerability in linux. EPSS estimates a 0.46% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 39.8% of scored vulnerabilities.
Severe, CVSS 7.5 (CVE.org); no exploitation reported by the 5 checked sources; EPSS 0% (FIRST, 03-11-2026)
Source freshness unavailable
How is this decided?Advisory lineage
Upstream 0 · Downstream 10 · Related 8Timeline
- 19-07-2026PublishedVulnerability first disclosed.
- 19-10-2026Last modifiedVulnerability information updated.
Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: wifi: iwlwifi: mld: stop TX during firmware restart When iwlwifi firmware crashes (e.g., NMI_INTERRUPT_UNKNOWN on Intel BE201/Wi-Fi 7), iwl_mld_nic_error() sets mld->fw_status.in_hw_restart to true. However, iwl_mld_tx_from_txq() does not check this flag before dequeuing frames from mac80211 and pushing them to the transport layer. Since the firmware is dead, iwl_trans_tx() returns -EIO for each frame, which then gets freed immediately. Under high-throughput conditions (e.g., Tailscale UDP traffic or active SSH sessions), this creates a tight dequeue-send-fail-free loop that wastes CPU cycles and generates rapid skb allocation churn, leading to memory pressure from slab fragmentation. The RX path already has this guard (iwl_mld_rx_mpdu checks in_hw_restart at rx.c:1906), and so does the TXQ allocation worker (iwl_mld_add_txqs_wk at tx.c:156). Add the same guard to iwl_mld_tx_from_txq() to stop all TX during firmware restart. Frames left in mac80211's TXQs are naturally drained after restart completes, when queue reallocation triggers iwl_mld_tx_from_txq() via iwl_mld_add_txq_list(), or when new upper-layer traffic invokes wake_tx_queue. Tested on ASUS Zenbook 14 UX3405CA with Intel BE201 (Wi-Fi 7) on kernel 6.19.5 where the firmware crashes approximately every 10-15 minutes under Tailscale traffic.
CVSS metrics
4 scores · 4 sources · 1 version- OSV · UbuntuEcosystem advisory · calculated7.5HighCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
- OSV · DebianEcosystem advisory · calculated7.5HighCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
- NVDNIST7.5HighCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
EPSS trend
Probability
0.46%
Chance of exploitation in the next 30 days
Percentile
40%
Versus all other CVEs
30-day change
Increase +0.11 pp
From 0.35% on 04-10-2026
Known exploited
Compare KEV catalogsNot in the CISA KEV catalog.
Not in the ENISA CNW catalog.
Not in the CIRCL catalog.
Public exploits
0 foundNo public exploits indexed.
Weaknesses
CWE · root causeAffected systems
Known conditions: network-reachable, no authentication, no user interaction (CVSS vector). Other conditions: not stated in public data.
Ubuntu118 products
- linux< 7.0.0-28.28
- linux-allwinner-5.19All versions (No fix recorded)
- linux-aws< 7.0.0-1009.9
- linux-aws-5.0All versions (No fix recorded)
- linux-aws-5.11All versions (No fix recorded)
Linux2 products
- linux≥ d1e879ec600f9b3bdd253167533959facfefb17b, < dc31c69476520bb4c2a208211a8d3c310a62c4d0 | ≥ d1e879ec600f9b3bdd253167533959facfefb17b, < 13f1786395dbbf3df73337063c798f1266be6151 | ≥ d1e879ec600f9b3bdd253167533959facfefb17b, < 2becb38a3e217ef2b2f42fddd7db7a25905ec291 | 6.15
- linux_kernel≥ 6.15, < 6.18.34 | ≥ 6.19, < 7.0.11 | 7.1:rc1 | 7.1:rc2 | 7.1:rc3 | 7.1:rc4
Debian1 product
- linux< 7.0.12-1
3 vendors · 121 products