CVE-2026-64551: Linux

Critical severity, CVSS 9.1. EPSS: 0.5% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days.

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: sctp: validate STALE_COOKIE cause length before reading staleness When an ERROR chunk with a STALE_COOKIE cause is received in the COOKIE_ECHOED state, sctp_sf_do_5_2_6_stale() reads the 4-byte Measure of Staleness that follows the cause header: err = (struct sctp_errhdr *)(chunk->skb->data); stale = ntohl(*(__be32 *)((u8 *)err + sizeof(*err))); err is the first cause in the chunk, not the STALE_COOKIE cause that caused the dispatch, and nothing guarantees the staleness field is present. sctp_walk_errors() only requires a cause to be as long as the 4-byte header, so for a STALE_COOKIE cause of length 4 the read runs past the cause, and for a minimal ERROR chunk past skb->tail. The value is echoed to the peer in the Cookie Preservative of the reply INIT, leaking uninitialized memory. sctp_sf_cookie_echoed_err() already walks to the STALE_COOKIE cause, so check its length there and pass it to sctp_sf_do_5_2_6_stale(), which reads that cause instead of the first one. A STALE_COOKIE cause too short to hold the staleness field is discarded. The read is reachable by any peer that can drive an association into COOKIE_ECHOED, including an unprivileged process using a raw SCTP socket in a user and network namespace.

Affected products

• Linux Linux: from 2.6.12, before 5.10.261 (fixed in 5.10.261); from 5.11, before 5.15.212 (fixed in 5.15.212); from 5.16, before 6.1.178 (fixed in 6.1.178); from 6.2, before 6.6.145 (fixed in 6.6.145); from 6.7, before 6.12.97 (fixed in 6.12.97); from 6.13, before 6.18.40 (fixed in 6.18.40); …

Published 2026-07-27. Last modified 2026-08-17.