CVE-2026-23444

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: wifi: mac80211: always free skb on ieee80211_tx_prepare_skb() failure ieee80211_tx_prepare_skb() has three error paths, but only two of them free the skb. The first error path (ieee80211_tx_prepare() returning TX_DROP) does not free it, while invoke_tx_handlers() failure and the fragmentation check both do. Add kfree_skb() to the first error path so all three are consistent, and remove the now-redundant frees in callers (ath9k, mt76, mac80211_hwsim) to avoid double-free. Document the skb ownership guarantee in the function's kdoc.

CVSS 3.1

5.5CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

EPSS

0.1% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days; higher than 2% of CVEs (scores of 2026-10-25)

CWE

CWE-401

Published

2026-04-03

Modified

2026-10-19

Record from

the NVD, synced 2026-10-21

Affected

• linux:linux_kernel

References

• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/06e769dddcbeb3baf2ce346273b53dd61fdbecf4
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/3b4d27acafaeab478fd24f79ad6e593a892828b9
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/50f1b690b4868923fbd242298def2fb88662f108
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/5ef8ca1c164786da24169af155c1ca1ff1353cf8
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/905ef207d5ed99ca64adfe39fba9ac46e434327a

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