CVE-2026-72004: wifi: mac80211: fix memory leak in ieee80211_register_hw()

Received
AliasesUBUNTU-CVE-2026-72004DEBIAN-CVE-2026-72004
Published 15-08-2026Last modified 17-08-2026

Vulnerability summary

CVE-2026-72004 is a vulnerability in linux with no CVSS score yet. EPSS estimates a 0.22% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 12.5% of scored vulnerabilities.

Priority
Insufficient evidence

No CVSS vector published; no exploitation reported by the 5 checked sources

Source freshness unavailable

How is this decided?
CVSS score
Not scored
010
No CVSS score recorded
EPSS score
0.22%
0%100%
Low · 0.00 pp in 30 days
KEVNot listedNot listed by any tracked catalog.
RansomwareNot flaggedNo ransomware use recorded.
Public exploits0No public exploits recorded

Advisory lineage

Upstream 0 · Downstream 16 · Related 16
SUSE-SU-2026:5091-1USN-8875-1USN-8875-2USN-8876-1USN-8877-1USN-8878-1

Timeline

  1. 15-08-2026
    PublishedVulnerability first disclosed.
  2. 17-08-2026
    Last modifiedVulnerability information updated.

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: wifi: mac80211: fix memory leak in ieee80211_register_hw() If kmemdup() fails while copying supported band structures, the error path jumps to fail_rate. This skips rate_control_deinitialize() and leaks the initialized local->rate_ctrl. Fix this by adding a fail_band label that shares the rate-control cleanup path before falling through to the remaining teardown. The bug was first flagged by an experimental analysis tool we are developing for kernel memory-management bugs while analyzing v6.13-rc1. The tool is still under development and is not yet publicly available. Manual inspection confirms that the bug is still present in v7.1-rc7. An x86_64 allyesconfig build showed no new warnings. As we do not have a suitable mac80211 device/driver combination to test with, no runtime testing was able to be performed.

CVSS metrics

Risk metrics not yet published.

EPSS trend

Probability

0.22%

Chance of exploitation in the next 30 days

Percentile

13%

Versus all other CVEs

30-day change

No change 0.00 pp

From 0.22% on 06-10-2026

06-10-202605-11-2026

Known exploited

Compare KEV catalogs
CISA KEV

Not in the CISA KEV catalog.

ENISA CNW

Not in the ENISA CNW catalog.

CIRCL

Not in the CIRCL catalog.

Public exploits

0 found

No public exploits indexed.

Weaknesses

CWE · root cause

No weakness data has been published for this record.

Affected systems

Version check

Known conditions: not stated in public data.

Ubuntu165 products
  • linuxAll versions (No fix recorded) | < 5.15.0-198.208 | < 6.8.0-147.147 | < 7.0.0-38.38
  • linux-allwinner-5.19All versions (No fix recorded)
  • linux-awsAll versions (No fix recorded) | < 5.15.0-1117.124 | < 6.8.0-1067.70 | < 7.0.0-1014.14
  • linux-aws-5.0All versions (No fix recorded)
  • linux-aws-5.11All versions (No fix recorded)
Debian1 product
  • linux< 6.1.180-1 | < 6.12.100-1 | < 7.1.5-1
Linux1 product
  • linux≥ 09b4a4faf9d037990ac4f8110dd944b27b42d5df, < f01eec75fd372961550b928902f3a2c11fca1daf | ≥ 09b4a4faf9d037990ac4f8110dd944b27b42d5df, < 3d8b9b290421c3cd505fcd2f551f143f8142786a | ≥ 09b4a4faf9d037990ac4f8110dd944b27b42d5df, < 08b71bd92317f99642b842cfc0d30200868162fc | ≥ 09b4a4faf9d037990ac4f8110dd944b27b42d5df, < a02b52fe54f7b5107aefa1ce28c2f69749c57616 | ≥ 09b4a4faf9d037990ac4f8110dd944b27b42d5df, < 45e9ac538cdff7bce656d731114a64eda85af0d7 | ≥ 09b4a4faf9d037990ac4f8110dd944b27b42d5df, < bdc0b8bfdc142439d6708b072e8159eb515ee7b0 | ≥ 09b4a4faf9d037990ac4f8110dd944b27b42d5df, < a7584f261e64fe14e45bdf70f343e16c1ee3a037 | ≥ 09b4a4faf9d037990ac4f8110dd944b27b42d5df, < 95fc02722edde02946d0d475221f2b2054d3d8ba | 4.20

3 vendors · 167 products

References

27 links
Show all 27 references