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HIGH

ftrace: Take trace_array reference before accessing its ftrace_ops

Published Sep 16, 2026

Description

The trace instance files set_ftrace_filter and set_ftrace_notrace was updated to work with specific trace instances (trace_arrays). The issue is that when these files are opened, there is a small race window where it will use the ftrace_ops from the inode->private pointer to get a reference to the trace_array and then take its reference. The problem is that the ftrace_ops itself could be freed. If the rmdir on the instance happens at the same time the set_ftrace_filter file is opened, the rmdir could have also freed the ftrace_ops and referencing it will cause a use-after-free bug and crash the kernel.

Instead, pass in the trace_array as the file private data (NULL for the top level instance), and then pass both the trace_array and the ftrace_ops to the ftrace_regex_open() function. If the trace_array is NULL, then it just uses the ftrace_ops without the need to take its reference (like normal). If the ftrace_ops is NULL, that is only the case for the top level instance and the global_ops can be used.

This allows the trace_array to have its reference incremented before touching the ftrace_ops that could also be freed when the instance is.

Affected products

Remediation

No remediation recorded yet.

Weaknesses (0)

No CWE recorded.

References (5)

Change history (0)

No recorded changes yet.

Sources
CVE.org / MITRE
Status PUBLISHED
Assigner Linux
Published Sep 16, 2026
Updated Oct 3, 2026
Reserved Sep 11, 2026
NVD
Status Received
Modified Oct 3, 2026
Red Hat
Severity n/a
Public date n/a
ENISA EUVD
Assigner Linux
Published Sep 16, 2026
Updated Oct 3, 2026
Exploited since n/a
EUVD-2026-80610