CVE-2026-72418

CVE Details

Release Date:	2026-08-15
Impact:	Important	What is this?

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: netfilter: nf_conncount: prevent connlimit drops for early confirmed ct Commit 69894e5b4c5e ("netfilter: nft_connlimit: update the count if add was skipped") introduced a regression where packets for valid connections are dropped when using connlimit for soft-limiting scenarios. The issue occurs when a new connection reuses a socket currently in the TIME_WAIT state. In this scenario, the connection tracking entry is evaluated as already confirmed. Previously, __nf_conncount_add() assumed that if a connection was confirmed and did not originate from the loopback interface, it should skip the addition and return -EEXIST. Skipping the addition triggers a garbage collection run that cleans up the TIME_WAIT connection. Consequently, the active connection count drops to 0, which xt_connlimit mishandles, leading to the false rejection of the perfectly valid new connection. Fix this by replacing the interface check with protocol-agnostic state checks. We now skip the tree insertion and preserve the lockless garbage collection optimization only if the connection is IPS_ASSURED. This allows early-confirmed setup packets (such as reused TIME_WAIT sockets or locally generated SYN-ACKs) to be properly evaluated and counted without falsely dropping. The goto check_connections path is maintained to ensure these setup packets are deduplicated correctly. This has been tested with slowhttptest and HTTP server configured locally to ensure we are not breaking soft-limiting scenarios for local or external connections. In addition, it was tested with a OVS zone limit too.

See more information about CVE-2026-72418 from MITRE CVE dictionary and NIST NVD

NOTE: The following CVSS metrics and score provided are preliminary and subject to review.

CVSS v3 metrics

Base Score:	5.5
Vector String:	CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
Version:	3.1
Attack Vector:	Local
Attack Complexity:	Low
Privileges Required:	Low
User Interaction:	None
Scope:	Unchanged
Confidentiality Impact:	None
Integrity Impact:	None
Availability Impact:	High

Errata information

Platform	Errata	Release Date
Oracle Linux version 10 (kernel-uek)	ELSA-2026-500248	2026-09-04
Oracle Linux version 8 (kernel-uek)	ELSA-2026-500249	2026-09-04
Oracle Linux version 9 (kernel-uek)	ELSA-2026-500248	2026-09-04
Oracle Linux version 9 (kernel-uek)	ELSA-2026-500249	2026-09-04