[CVE-2026-97532][MODERATE 7.0] scsi: qla2xxx: Null out freed pointers in qla2x00_mem_alloc() error path [ Upstream

[CVE-2026-97532][MODERATE 7.0] scsi: qla2xxx: Null out freed pointers in qla2x00_mem_alloc() error path [ Upstream

[AL-KERNEL]

CVE: CVE-2026-97532
Priority: MODERATE 7.0
AL-KERNEL base severity: MODERATE
KPANIC flag: YES
Patch: scsi: qla2xxx: Null out freed pointers in qla2x00_mem_alloc() error path [ Upstream
Commit: a57570229edb7a0990d5c8067daeb9ac8858a961
Upstream patch: https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git/commit/?id=a57570229edb7a0990d5c8067daeb9ac8858a961
Original CVE announcement: https://lore.kernel.org/linux-cve-announce/?q=CVE-2026-97532
Analysis date: Fri, 25 Sep 2026 07:32:04 -0400
ActionableScore: 5
ActionableScore lower bound: unknown
Actionable bucket: Actionable Moderate / Strong Important candidate requiring manual review
Manual review required: YES

Summary:
No one-sentence report phrase was found.

======================================================================
ABOUT THIS REPORT
======================================================================

The original Linux kernel CVE announcement for CVE-2026-97532 is available here:
https://lore.kernel.org/linux-cve-announce/?q=CVE-2026-97532

The original announcement does not normally provide a security severity
estimate, CVSS assessment, or enough information to determine whether the
reported kernel bug represents a practically relevant security issue.

This report was generated by AL-KERNEL, an AI-assisted Linux kernel
vulnerability analysis system developed by Alexander Larkin. It combines
an autonomous classifier with LLM-assisted technical analysis and a
separate ActionableScore mechanism.

The purpose of this report is to prioritize Linux kernel CVEs before
manual review, identify cases that require prompt investigation, and
support automatic closure of issues that are unlikely to have meaningful
security impact.

Published priority for this report: MODERATE 7.0
Manual review required: YES

A detailed explanation of the methodology and priority rules is included
at the end of this message.

======================================================================
AL-KERNEL CLASSIFICATION RESULT
======================================================================

CVE-2026-97532	MODERATE	https://www.kernelcve.org/list/?q=CVE-2026-97532 CHECK WITH IMPACT FROM ORIG NN LOW	Maybe valid. Check manually. Hints by AL-KERNEL: The best (paranoid) CVSS is 'AV:L/AC:H/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H';CWE-415;**CWE-476;CWE-825;*CWE-416;Other CVSS 'AV:L/AC:H/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H';BEST CVSS score: '6.4';DESCR 'A qla2xxx driver probe failure can leave dangling pointers after resources have already been freed in qla2x00_mem_alloc(). The later qla2x00_mem_free() cleanup can free the same objects again. It can also call dma_pool_free() after the corresponding DMA pool was destroyed and cleared, causing a NULL pointer dereference and kernel crash. For the CVSS the PR:H is used because reliably reaching this error path normally requires administrative control of driver loading, device reprobe, reset, or similar adapter management operations. The issue is not directly network reachable based on the patch. The confirmed impact is local denial of service. The explicit double free creates a plausible memory corruption risk and may permit confidentiality or integrity impact in a worst case scenario, so manual review is required.';YES REQUIRES MANUAL CHECK; ,and ActionableScore result is Actionable Moderate / Strong Important candidate requiring manual review (with actual score 5)	YES	INIT ERRORPATH UAF DMAorINTERRUPT HARDWARE LINUS KPANIC MEMORY  KPANIC INCREASED_TO_HIGH_BASED_ON_GUESSCVSS KPANIC LOWERED_FROM_HIGH_BASED_ON_GUESSCVSS_AND_PRH	NO	NO	checked

======================================================================
ACTIONABLESCORE ANALYSIS
======================================================================

ActionableScore=5
PrimitiveClass=CLASS_B
RealUAF=YES
HostAdminRequired=UNKNOWN
NamespaceScopedPrivilege=UNKNOWN
ImportantCandidate=YES
ManualReview=REQUIRED
AutoDowngradeAllowed=NO

1. ActionableScore

* Raw conservative score: 4
* Conservative score: 5
* Raw paranoid score: 5
* Paranoid score: 5
* Conservative FLOOR 5 applied: 4 -> 5 because a concrete second lifetime-mutating free operation reaches the same potentially freed references.
* Final recommended bucket: **Actionable Moderate / Strong Important candidate requiring manual review**::

2. Signal breakdown

* +2 Real UAF or active lifetime violation. The error labels free adapter-owned allocations while leaving the exact adapter member pointers reachable. qla2x00_mem_free later consumes those same stale members.
* +1 Concrete repeated release or lifetime mutation. The first kfree, dma_free_coherent, dma_pool_free, or dma_pool_destroy operation can end or invalidate the allocation lifetime. The corresponding pointer remains stored in ha and later reaches another free operation through qla2x00_mem_free.
* +1 Reliable kernel crash or strong DoS. The patch explicitly describes dma_pool_free using ha->s_dma_pool after that pool was destroyed and cleared to NULL. This supports a NULL pointer dereference and kernel crash.
* +1 Paranoid repeated-lifetime corruption leverage. The second free is not only a stale read or immediate poisoned-pointer dereference. It can invoke allocator or DMA allocation lifetime handling through storage whose original object lifetime may already have ended. Controlled reclaim, directed overwrite, or arbitrary read/write is not established.

Important non-awarded signals:

* Controlled reclaim or attacker-controlled replacement of freed allocations is not demonstrated.
* Arbitrary kernel write, callback control, and refcount takeover are not demonstrated.
* Confidentiality and integrity effects are not awarded. A double free can corrupt allocator state, but the supplied evidence does not establish disclosure or unauthorized modification.
* Remote reachability is not established. Fibre Channel fabric or firmware interaction is not equivalent to a directly network-triggerable path.
* Local unprivileged triggering is not established.
* No race penalty is applied. This is an ordered error-unwind sequence, not a timing race.
* No niche-driver or hardware penalty is applied. The code being a QLogic driver alone does not prove rare hardware or physical-only reachability.
* No separate structured stale-object leverage point is awarded. The repeated free is already scored as the concrete repeated lifetime mutation.
* No Weak LPE point is awarded for the same repeated-free fact.
* No additional availability point is awarded because the demonstrated NULL dereference crash is already counted.

Repeated-release assessment:

* First release can end lifetime: yes. kfree and dma_free_coherent release their allocations, while dma_pool_destroy invalidates the DMA pool object.
* Exact references survive: yes. The adapter fields are not cleared on the affected failure labels.
* Second lifetime mutation is concrete: yes. The commit explicitly states qla2x00_mem_free frees the same members again.
* Concrete repeated release or refcount point: awarded.
* Paranoid repeated-refcount leverage point: awarded as unresolved double-free allocator or DMA lifetime corruption, not because generic heap reuse is theoretically possible.
* FLOOR 5: applied.

3. Reachability analysis

The vulnerable sequence occurs during qla2xxx adapter probe when qla2x00_mem_alloc fails and qla2x00_probe_one enters probe_hw_failed. The supplied evidence shows the bug is reachable during driver initialization failure, but does not establish who can reliably induce the allocation failure and subsequent probe cleanup.

Loading, rebinding, resetting, or reprobeing a PCI Fibre Channel adapter often requires host-level administrative control. However, the supplied patch does not prove that host-admin-equivalent privilege is required for every complete trigger sequence. Automatic probe, device recovery, firmware behavior, hardware faults, and system resource conditions can also reach initialization error paths. Therefore HostAdminRequired is UNKNOWN rather than YES.

NamespaceScopedPrivilege is UNKNOWN. No network namespace, user namespace, delegated capability, or complete below-host-admin trigger path is established. No prior privileged setup is proven beyond the existence of a supported qla2xxx-capable adapter and driver binding. No direct remote attacker path is shown. A Fibre Channel peer or firmware-mediated condition should not be treated as direct network reachability without evidence that it can drive this allocation failure and cleanup sequence.

4. Primitive and severity interpretation

The exact primitive is a concrete double-release lifetime violation in an error-unwind path. Several adapter fields are freed but remain non-NULL. The later common cleanup path performs another free using those stale fields. This is stronger than an ordinary stale cleanup dereference because the second operation actively mutates allocator or DMA resource lifetime state through a potentially dangling reference.

The affected objects are adapter-owned allocations and DMA pool resources. This is not a fixed asynchronous stale-buffer scenario. The demonstrated terminal effects include a NULL dma_pool dereference and kernel crash. The double-free paths additionally retain unresolved post-lifetime corruption potential, but there is no supplied evidence of controlled object replacement, attacker-shaped post-free contents, arbitrary write, information disclosure, or privilege escalation.

PrimitiveClass is CLASS_B. The issue is not CLASS_A because no controlled reclaim, directed corruption, callback control, authorization bypass, or practical exploitation chain is established. ImportantCandidate is YES because the concrete repeated free through stale references creates meaningful unresolved lifetime-corruption leverage beyond a simple crash-only stale dereference. AutoDowngradeAllowed is NO because automatically closing the issue as an ordinary driver crash would discard the explicit double-free primitive.

Likely operational severity is Actionable Moderate. It should receive manual investigation of real deployment exposure, the qla2x00_mem_free call sequence, allocator behavior for the relevant allocations, and whether non-admin-triggerable adapter reset or reprobe paths exist.

5. One-sentence report phrase

A qla2xxx probe failure can leave freed adapter resource pointers reachable and cause qla2x00_mem_free to release them again, resulting in a kernel crash and a concrete double-free lifetime corruption primitive that requires manual review.

6. Manual review recommendation

MANUAL CHECK REQUIRED

The patch establishes concrete repeated frees of the same potentially invalid pointers, including DMA-related resources, while the real attacker-controlled reachability and post-free corruption leverage remain unresolved.

7. Call-site confidence

Call-site confidence: medium

======================================================================
UPSTREAM PATCH SUMMARY
======================================================================

Patch: scsi: qla2xxx: Null out freed pointers in qla2x00_mem_alloc() error path [ Upstream
Commit: a57570229edb7a0990d5c8067daeb9ac8858a961
Upstream URL: https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git/commit/?id=a57570229edb7a0990d5c8067daeb9ac8858a961

Changed files:
  drivers/scsi/qla2xxx/qla_os.c

Diff excerpt:

Not included in this email. See the upstream URL for the full patch.

Full patch:
https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git/commit/?id=a57570229edb7a0990d5c8067daeb9ac8858a961

======================================================================
DETAILED REPORT METHODOLOGY
======================================================================

The original Linux kernel CVE announcement for CVE-2026-97532 can be found here:
https://lore.kernel.org/linux-cve-announce/?q=CVE-2026-97532

The original CVE announcement normally does not include a security-level
estimate. In particular, it may not contain a CVSS assessment, an impact
level, or enough information to determine whether the reported bug is a
practically relevant security issue. One purpose of this parallel CVE list
is to provide that missing technical and prioritization information.

The original goal of the AL-KERNEL project was to prioritize Linux kernel
CVE analysis automatically before manual review. The system can also help
identify non-security issues that may be suitable for automatic closure.

This report was generated by AL-KERNEL, an AI-assisted Linux kernel
vulnerability analysis system developed by Alexander Larkin.

The first analysis stage combines an autonomous classifier with additional
LLM-based analysis. The autonomous classifier runs locally on a CPU and is
based on a backpropagation neural network. Together, these mechanisms
produce a technical vulnerability description, identify likely weakness
types, estimate CVSS severity, and provide input for ActionableScore.

Two CVSS estimates are retained because incomplete kernel vulnerability
information often permits more than one defensible interpretation:

  Conservative CVSS vector: AV:L/AC:H/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
  The Best / paranoid CVSS vector: AV:L/AC:H/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
  The Best / paranoid CVSS score: 6.4

The conservative vector represents a lower-impact interpretation.
The Best/paranoid vector intentionally represents a plausible upper-bound
interpretation and should not automatically be treated as demonstrated
real-world impact.

CVSS may also need to be adjusted for a particular Linux deployment,
because actual reachability, privileges, enabled kernel configuration,
hardware, namespaces, exposed device nodes, and other environmental
conditions can differ significantly between systems.

A separate ActionableScore mechanism evaluates practical remediation
urgency. Its analysis may include reachability, attack prerequisites,
subsystem exposure, memory-corruption characteristics, denial-of-service
reliability, and possible confidentiality, integrity, or
privilege-escalation impact.

  Conservative ActionableScore: unknown
  Paranoid ActionableScore: 5

The final base severity is taken directly from the second tab-separated
field of the AL-KERNEL classification result. ActionableScore does not
replace or independently override that final AL-KERNEL decision, and
if ActionableScore adjusted impact level of ALKERNEL, then you would see
self-readable flags above like INCREASED_TO_HIGH_BASED_ON_ACTIONABLESCOREHIGHEREQTHAN7.

For an AL-KERNEL result of MODERATE, this report uses the following
additional presentation split:

  ActionableScore below 5   -> MODERATE REGULAR
  ActionableScore 5 or more -> MODERATE 7.0

The distinction between MODERATE REGULAR and MODERATE 7.0 makes it
possible to identify Moderate issues that should receive manual analysis
and fixes before lower-priority MODERATE REGULAR issues. In many cases,
MODERATE REGULAR fixes may wait for a later rebase or routine update.

There is one override in which MODERATE REGULAR becomes MODERATE 7.0
even when the ActionableScore is below 5. When the AL-KERNEL result
contains the KPANIC flag, a MODERATE result is always presented as
MODERATE 7.0. The KPANIC flag selected with few regexps without
usage of AI at all, so it helps to detect cases when Kernel Crash happens
and similar (to filter False-Negative results from the LLM usage).

KPANIC indicates that a reliable kernel crash, kernel panic, or similarly
serious kernel availability impact was identified by the classification
workflow.

AL-KERNEL base severity for this report: MODERATE
KPANIC detected for this report: YES
Published priority for this report (same as in Subject): MODERATE 7.0

These results are intended to support engineering triage. They are
machine-generated estimates, and cases marked for manual review should
be validated by a human security engineer before final disposition.
For more info read docs linked from here: https://kernelcve.org/
(and you can submit you own patch there to generate such a report
for non-existant CVE-id yet).

Note that in many cases this AI tool selects higher severity, than
real is (means you can expect Importants instead of Moderate 7.0 or
Moderates 7.0 instead of regular Moderates). If you see such cases,
please use reply email interface to add additional manual analyses
info to this particular CVE.
And please, please, let me know when you see Lows instead of Importants
or Important instead of Low (because particular for such cases I
need to tune this AI tool to make it better for this one and next similar).
My contact email for such notifications is alexanjelausa@gmail.com (and both
send reply to CVE record itself too and see "reply" button below for howto reply).