Vulnerability in Linux

CVE-2026-45843

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: slip: bound decode() reads against the compressed packet length slhc_uncompress() parses a VJ-compressed TCP header by advancing a pointer through the packet via decode() and pull16(). Neither helper bounds-checks against isize, and decode() masks its return with & 0xffff so it can never return the -1 that callers test for -- those error paths are dead code. A short compressed frame whose change byte requests optional fields lets decode() read past the end of the packet. The over-read bytes are folded into the cached cstate and reflected into subsequent reconstructed packets. Make decode() and pull16() take the packet end pointer and return -1 when exhausted. Add a bounds check before the TCP-checksum read. The existing == -1 tests now do what they were always meant to.

Published · last modified .

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 8.2 (High). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:L/A:N.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.005 (39.7th percentile), scored .

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 40th percentile — 39.7% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS trend (30 days)EPSS over the last 30 days for CVE-2026-45843: held from 0.004 to 0.005.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.004 · newest: 0.005 · change: +0.001

Affected products

  • Linux — versions 1da177e4c3f41524e886b7f1b8a0c1fc7321cac2, 5.15.209, 7.1-rc1
  • Linux Kernel — versions 2.6.12

References

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2026-45843?
CVE-2026-45843 is a high-severity vulnerability in Linux. CVSS score: 8.2/10. Published 2026-05-27.
How severe is CVE-2026-45843?
High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 8.2 out of 10.