CVE-2026-98503
Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
packet: use ubuf_info completion for TX_RING packets
tpacket_snd sends skbs with frags pointing into its ring slots. Slots are released when skb->destructor is called.
A call to skb_orphan calls skb->destructor before the skb is freed. This can cause the slot to be reused while still linked into the skb.
Switch to standard zerocopy completion (ubuf_info) so the slot is only released once all references to the payload are freed or copied. Restore skb->destructor to standard sock_wfree.
The ubuf_info completion callback can be called with a NULL skb, but only from net_zcopy_put and related API, used by zerocopy implementations that hold their own reference on the uarg, such as MSG_ZEROCOPY. This uarg is only ever completed from skb_zcopy_clear, so skb is always set.
To prevent userspace from aliasing in-flight state on shared ring slots, allocate tpacket_uarg per packet, rather than per slot. This adds a small allocation to the transmit path. Use standard kmalloc to allow backporting to stable kernels.
The uarg holds an sk_wmem_alloc reference, rather than an sk_refcnt reference. packet_free_tx_ring waits on sk_wmem_alloc before freeing the ring pages. Always allocate vec->deferred for tx_ring so page-backed rings also wait on sk_wmem_alloc when skb_copy_ubufs drops page refs before calling tpacket_ubuf_complete.
Drop the tx_ring.pg_vec test that tpacket_destruct_skb performed before accessing the slot. The sk_wmem_alloc reference now guarantees that the slot is valid. The test is also not sufficient by itself, as it reads pg_vec without pg_vec_lock, so it can race with packet_set_ring.
As a result a slot is released when its payload is copied, which can be before transmission (e.g., in skb_orphan_frags_rx). If copied before skb_tx_timestamp() is called, no slot timestamp is recorded, similar to when skb_orphan() was called early in the datapath before this patch.
Revert the now unused previous skb_zcopy_.._nouarg infra.
Depends on commit 992cc9f94ca9 ("net/packet: defer vmalloc TX_RING free until skbs finish").
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