CVE-2026-68416 is a vulnerability in Linux Kernel
Published on August 10, 2026
mtd: fix double free and WARN_ON in add_mtd_device() error paths
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
mtd: fix double free and WARN_ON in add_mtd_device() error paths
When device_register() or mtd_nvmem_add() fails inside
add_mtd_device() for a partition, the error handling triggers
mtd_release() via put_device() or device_unregister(). mtd_release()
calls release_mtd_partition() which frees the mtd_info structure.
However, callers such as mtd_add_partition() and add_mtd_partitions()
also call free_partition() in their error paths, resulting in a double
free.
Additionally, release_mtd_partition() hits WARN_ON(!list_empty(
&mtd->part.node)) because the partition node is still linked in the
parent's partitions list when the release callback fires from the
add_mtd_device() error path.
Fix this by overriding dev->type and dev->release before put_device()
in the error paths, so that device_release() invokes a no-op function
instead of mtd_release(). For the mtd_nvmem_add() failure case,
device_unregister() is replaced with device_del() to separate the
device removal from the final kobject reference drop, allowing the
override to take effect before put_device() is called.
The callers' error paths (list_del + free_partition) remain the sole
owners of mtd_info lifetime on add_mtd_device() failure, which is the
expected contract.
The normal partition teardown path is not affected: del_mtd_device()
goes through kref_put() -> mtd_device_release() -> device_unregister()
with dev->type still set to &mtd_devtype, so mtd_release() ->
release_mtd_partition() continues to work correctly for the regular
removal case.
Products Associated with CVE-2026-68416
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Affected Versions
Linux:- Version 19bfa9ebebb5ec0695def57eb1d80de7e9cab369 and below ffe21a3545b439e7b11578a701c22a847c149561 is affected.
- Version 19bfa9ebebb5ec0695def57eb1d80de7e9cab369 and below e1e96aca1bdf391e2f49531c270ffc134e5b49a5 is affected.
- Version 19bfa9ebebb5ec0695def57eb1d80de7e9cab369 and below f98ae09c727dcf34f745c875661c64b642e4abfa is affected.
- Version 19bfa9ebebb5ec0695def57eb1d80de7e9cab369 and below 820f983d641937a787e841ee4b93501f69f5683e is affected.
- Version 19bfa9ebebb5ec0695def57eb1d80de7e9cab369 and below 9d4af746af8ce27eefc2338b2feaa1e01f28b6c3 is affected.
- Version 6.6 is affected.
- Before 6.6 is unaffected.
- Version 6.6.148, <= 6.6.* is unaffected.
- Version 6.12.101, <= 6.12.* is unaffected.
- Version 6.18.42, <= 6.18.* is unaffected.
- Version 7.1.6, <= 7.1.* is unaffected.
- Version 7.2-rc4, <= * is unaffected.