published October 18, 2026
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
thunderbolt: Fix KASAN reported use-after-free when request is canceled
Alan reported that when doing stress testing sometimes KASAN notices
use-after-free during control channel operation (stripped down keeping
the relevant parts):
BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in tb_cfg_request_sync+0x240/0x250 [thunderbolt]
Read of size 24 at addr ffff88811067f290 by task kworker/u40:2/1760
<TASK>
tb_cfg_request_sync+0x240/0x250 [thunderbolt]
tb_cfg_read_raw+0x367/0x510 [thunderbolt]
tb_cfg_read+0xec/0x240 [thunderbolt]
tb_port_get_link_generation+0x258/0x420 [thunderbolt]
tb_usb3_consumed_bandwidth+0x1c1/0x2c0 [thunderbolt]
tb_tunnel_consumed_bandwidth+0xfd/0x910 [thunderbolt]
tb_available_bandwidth+0x5f2/0xeb0 [thunderbolt]
tb_recalc_estimated_bandwidth+0x2a0/0x1bc0 [thunderbolt]
tb_handle_dp_bandwidth_request+0x1897/0x5e20 [thunderbolt]
process_one_work+0x675/0x1230
worker_thread+0x5e6/0xf70
kthread+0x365/0x470
ret_from_fork+0x54d/0x710
ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30
</TASK>
Allocated by task 1760:
__kmalloc_cache_noprof+0x1ee/0x550
tb_cfg_read_raw+0x1d3/0x510 [thunderbolt]
tb_cfg_read+0xec/0x240 [thunderbolt]
tb_port_get_link_generation+0x258/0x420 [thunderbolt]
tb_usb3_consumed_bandwidth+0x1c1/0x2c0 [thunderbolt]
tb_tunnel_consumed_bandwidth+0xfd/0x910 [thunderbolt]
tb_available_bandwidth+0x5f2/0xeb0 [thunderbolt]
tb_recalc_estimated_bandwidth+0x2a0/0x1bc0 [thunderbolt]
tb_handle_dp_bandwidth_request+0x1897/0x5e20 [thunderbolt]
process_one_work+0x675/0x1230
worker_thread+0x5e6/0xf70
kthread+0x365/0x470
ret_from_fork+0x54d/0x710
ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30
Freed by task 926:
kfree+0x18f/0x4a0
tb_cfg_request_put+0xb7/0xe0 [thunderbolt]
tb_cfg_request_work+0x82/0x120 [thunderbolt]
process_one_work+0x675/0x1230
worker_thread+0x5e6/0xf70
kthread+0x365/0x470
ret_from_fork+0x54d/0x710
ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30
Second to last potentially related work creation:
__queue_work+0x575/0xd00
queue_work_on+0x77/0x80
tb_cfg_request_cancel+0xc7/0x260 [thunderbolt]
tb_cfg_request_sync+0x1f6/0x250 [thunderbolt]
tb_cfg_read_raw+0x367/0x510 [thunderbolt]
tb_cfg_read+0xec/0x240 [thunderbolt]
tb_port_get_link_generation+0x258/0x420 [thunderbolt]
tb_usb3_consumed_bandwidth+0x1c1/0x2c0 [thunderbolt]
tb_tunnel_consumed_bandwidth+0xfd/0x910 [thunderbolt]
tb_available_bandwidth+0x5f2/0xeb0 [thunderbolt]
tb_recalc_estimated_bandwidth+0x2a0/0x1bc0 [thunderbolt]
tb_handle_dp_bandwidth_request+0x1897/0x5e20 [thunderbolt]
process_one_work+0x675/0x1230
worker_thread+0x5e6/0xf70
kthread+0x365/0x470
ret_from_fork+0x54d/0x710
ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30
The last stack trace is helpful because it shows that we are cancelling
a request and looking at tb_cfg_request_cancel() what might happen is
that tb_cfg_request_work() completes right before tb_cfg_request_cancel()
starts and because of this it will call schedule_work() queueing the
same work to run again. However, it is already removed from the
request_queue and reference count is dropped so when
tb_cfg_request_work() triggers again it will access memory that is
already released.
Fix this so that we first make sure a cancelled request is not handed
away from tb_cfg_request_find() or scheduled to run. Then instead of
relying on the worker to clean up the request we will do it in
tb_cfg_request_cancel() after the work is canceled from running. Make
tb_cfg_request_dequeue() release the request only if it was actually
removed from the queue.