HIGH
net/ipv6 TunnelExtHdr DoS
CVE-2026-98852
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
01Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net: extend IPv6 exthdr detection of tunneled packets Commit c4336a07eb6b ("net: correctly handle tunneled traffic on IPV6_CSUM GSO fallback") split skb_gso_has_extension_hdr() into mutually exclusive branches on skb->encapsulation. This did not yet address all paths: 1. With skb->encapsulation set, the outer header is not checked. IPv6 tunnels such as ip6_gre and ip6_tunnel add an outer Destination Options header by default (encap_limit). Their GSO packets skip software GSO, then skb_csum_hwoffload_help() sees the outer extension header and calls skb_checksum_help() on the GSO skb, which warns and drops it. 2. Tunnels over IPv6 without an outer transport header, such as ip6_tunnel, leave skb->transport_header at the inner transport header. skb_network_header_len() then spans the outer IPv6, tunnel and inner IP headers, a false positive. 3. UDP tunnels without an inner network header, such as SCTP-in-UDP or PSP, have no inner IPv6 header to check. Decide on the outer header alone. 4. Directly dereferencing inner_ip_hdr(skb)->version without skb_header_pointer() is unsafe. Instead, check ipv6_ext_hdr(nexthdr) on the outer IPv6 header and, if set, on the inner IPv6 header. Read the headers with skb_header_pointer(). Keep the skb_network_header_len() check when !skb->encapsulation to also catch encapsulated packets without skb->encapsulation (e.g., virtio). Use the same helper in skb_csum_hwoffload_help(). Its open coded test has the false positive of (2) and ignores the inner header. Background: checksum offload of tunneled packets invariants: Non-GSO skb: - If the inner packet is CHECKSUM_PARTIAL, Local Checksum Offload computes the outer checksum in software and the device offloads only the inner L4 checksum. - If the inner packet is CHECKSUM_NONE (e.g., SCTP-in-UDP, ESP-in-UDP, Remote Checksum Offload), the device offloads the outer UDP or GRE checksum instead. GSO skb: - A device with NETIF_F_GSO_UDP_TUNNEL_CSUM or NETIF_F_GSO_GRE_CSUM computes both inner and outer checksums per segment. The outer checksum is seeded with only the pseudo-header checksum. A NETIF_F_IPV6_CSUM device must parse through the outer headers to reach the inner ones.
02KernelScan AI Analysis
Risk summary
Systems with IPv6 tunnels (ip6_gre, ip6_tunnel, UDP tunnels) that transmit large GSO packets can experience silent packet drops when the outer IPv6 header carries extension headers such as the default encap_limit Destination Option. An attacker who can induce the target to send traffic through such a tunnel — for example by communicating with an IP routed through the tunnel — can cause a denial of service. The bug also contains an unsafe header dereference that could theoretically lead to an out-of-bounds read, though the primary demonstrated impact is availability loss.
Vulnerability analysis
The IPv6 checksum offload logic for large segmented packets mishandled tunneled traffic in several ways. It did not check the outer IPv6 header for extension headers when a tunnel was active, miscalculated header lengths for certain tunnel types, failed to account for tunnels lacking an inner IP header, and accessed the inner header unsafely. This caused legitimate packets carrying the default tunnel extension headers to be incorrectly flagged and dropped, producing a kernel warning and a repeatable denial of service for any traffic using the affected tunnels. The fix replaces the logic with a single helper that safely examines both the outer and inner IPv6 headers for extension headers, correcting the false positives and restoring proper checksum offload behavior.
Lifecycle
03Fix Versions
| Branch | Introduced | Fixed in | Patch commit |
|---|---|---|---|
| 6.1 | 6.1.168 | 6.2 | cabacdf98e09 |
| 6.12 | 6.12.81 | 6.12.113 | 44ba9dc568c8 |
| 6.18 | 6.18.22 | 6.18.56 | aa480f05aed7 |
| 6.19 | 6.19.12 | 6.20 | 5f0764cb1c81 |
| 6.6 | 6.6.134 | 6.6.160 | fdbd83c2d929 |
| 7.2 | — | 7.2.10 | — |
| mainline | — | 7.3 | — |
04CIP Kernels
State of the newest release of each Civil Infrastructure Platform SLTS tree, from CIP's own fix records.
| CIP tree | State |
|---|---|
| cip/6.12 | Affected — no CIP fix yet (latest 6.12.112-cip33) |
| cip/6.1 | Affected — no CIP fix yet (latest 6.1.189-cip61) |
| cip/6.1-rt | Affected — no CIP fix yet (latest 6.1.189-cip61-rt32) |