CVE-2026-64017
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: blk-mq: pop cached request if it is usable When submitting a bio to blk-mq, if the task should sleep after peeking a cached request, but before it pops it, the plug flushes and calls blk_mq_free_plug_rqs, freeing the cached_rqs. This creates a use-after-free bug. Fix this by popping the cached request before any possible blocking calls if it is suitable for use. Popping this request first holds a queue reference, so avoid any serialization races with queue freezes and can safely proceed with dispatching that request to the driver. This potentially increases a timing window from when a driver wants to freeze its queue to when requests stop being dispatched. That scenario is off the fast path though, and drivers need to appropriately handle requests during a freeze request anyway. The downside is the popped element needs to be individually freed when we performed a bio plug merge. The cached request would have had to be freed later anyway, but this patch does it inline with building the plug list instead of after flushing it.
No public exploitation has been reported so far. No distribution fix is listed yet; apply vendor mitigations and monitor.
Recommended action: Track your distribution's security tracker and apply the fix as soon as it ships.
Severity metrics
CVSS 3.1 : 7.8 HIGH
Vector: AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Affected & fixed versions by distribution
Versions are the native distribution strings (backport-aware): RHEL/Debian/SUSE backport fixes, so compare with the distro version comparator (dpkg / rpm / vercmp), not the upstream version.
No affected package in the tracked watchlist yet (Debian, Ubuntu, Arch, SUSE, Red Hat...). Triage may still be pending.