Vulnerability in Linux

CVE-2026-74461

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: i2c: imx: Cancel hrtimer before clearing slave pointer In i2c_imx_unreg_slave(), the slave pointer is set to NULL after disabling interrupts. However, a pending interrupt might already have started the hrtimer (i2c_imx_slave_timeout) before the pointer was cleared. If the hrtimer fires after i2c_imx->slave is set to NULL, the timer callback i2c_imx_slave_finish_op() will call i2c_imx_slave_event() with a NULL slave pointer, which results in a use-after-free / NULL pointer dereference. Fix by canceling the hrtimer and waiting for it to complete after disabling interrupts, before clearing the slave pointer.

Published · last modified .

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 8.4 (High). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.002 (7.8th percentile), scored .

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 8th percentile — 7.8% 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-2026-74461: held from 0.001 to 0.002.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.001 · newest: 0.002 · change: +0.001

Affected products

  • Linux — versions 7.2-rc6, 7.2, 7.1.8

References

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2026-74461?
CVE-2026-74461 is a high-severity vulnerability in Linux. CVSS score: 8.4/10. Published 2026-08-15.
How severe is CVE-2026-74461?
High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 8.4 out of 10.