Null Pointer Dereference Vulnerability in Airoha Driver of Linux Kernel

CVE-2026-53298

What is CVE-2026-53298?

The Airoha network driver in the Linux Kernel is susceptible to a NULL pointer dereference issue due to improper initialization during the process of setting up receive queues. When queue entry or DMA descriptor list allocation fails in the airoha_qdma_init_rx_queue function, this results in a null pointer dereference during cleanup if the initialization steps are not properly executed. The vulnerability stems from the early initialization of descriptor values, which can lead to instability and unexpected application behavior if not resolved. Moving the descriptor initialization to the end of the transmission queue initialization greatly mitigates the risk of such failures, ensuring more robust operations and preventing potential memory leaks during allocation failures.

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