Back

MEDIUM

idpf: Fix RSS LUT NULL ptr issue after soft reset

Published Jan 23, 2026

Description

During soft reset, the RSS LUT is freed and not restored unless the interface is up. If an ethtool command that accesses the rss lut is attempted immediately after reset, it will result in NULL ptr dereference. Also, there is no need to reset the rss lut if the soft reset does not involve queue count change.

After soft reset, set the RSS LUT to default values based on the updated queue count only if the reset was a result of a queue count change and the LUT was not configured by the user. In all other cases, don't touch the LUT.

Steps to reproduce:

** Bring the interface down (if up) ifconfig eth1 down

** update the queue count (eg., 27->20) ethtool -L eth1 combined 20

** display the RSS LUT ethtool -x eth1

[82375.558338] BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference, address: 0000000000000000 [82375.558373] #PF: supervisor read access in kernel mode [82375.558391] #PF: error_code(0x0000) - not-present page [82375.558408] PGD 0 P4D 0 [82375.558421] Oops: Oops: 0000 [#1] SMP NOPTI <snip> [82375.558516] RIP: 0010:idpf_get_rxfh+0x108/0x150 [idpf] [82375.558786] Call Trace: [82375.558793] <TASK> [82375.558804] rss_prepare.isra.0+0x187/0x2a0 [82375.558827] rss_prepare_data+0x3a/0x50 [82375.558845] ethnl_default_doit+0x13d/0x3e0 [82375.558863] genl_family_rcv_msg_doit+0x11f/0x180 [82375.558886] genl_rcv_msg+0x1ad/0x2b0 [82375.558902] ? __pfx_ethnl_default_doit+0x10/0x10 [82375.558920] ? __pfx_genl_rcv_msg+0x10/0x10 [82375.558937] netlink_rcv_skb+0x58/0x100 [82375.558957] genl_rcv+0x2c/0x50 [82375.558971] netlink_unicast+0x289/0x3e0 [82375.558988] netlink_sendmsg+0x215/0x440 [82375.559005] __sys_sendto+0x234/0x240 [82375.559555] __x64_sys_sendto+0x28/0x30 [82375.560068] x64_sys_call+0x1909/0x1da0 [82375.560576] do_syscall_64+0x7a/0xfa0 [82375.561076] ? clear_bhb_loop+0x60/0xb0 [82375.561567] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x76/0x7e <snip>

Affected products

Remediation

Red Hat statement

A NULL pointer dereference can be triggered in the idpf driver when an ethtool command accesses the RSS indirection table immediately after a soft reset, as the RSS LUT may have been freed but not reinitialized. This results in a reliable kernel crash and constitutes a local denial-of-service condition, typically requiring CAP_NET_ADMIN privileges.

References (9)

Change history (0)

No recorded changes yet.

Sources
CVE.org / MITRE
Status PUBLISHED
Assigner Linux
Published Jan 23, 2026
Updated May 11, 2026
Reserved Jan 13, 2026
NVD
Status Modified
Modified Jun 17, 2026
Red Hat
Severity Moderate
Public date Jan 23, 2026
ENISA EUVD
Assigner Linux
Published Jan 23, 2026
Updated May 11, 2026
Exploited since n/a
EUVD-2026-4301