Tracker / CVE-2026-46040
CVE-2026-46040
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: inotify: fix watch count leak when fsnotify_add_inode_mark_locked() fails When fsnotify_add_inode_mark_locked() fails in inotify_new_watch(), the error path calls inotify_remove_from_idr() but does not call dec_inotify_watches() to undo the preceding inc_inotify_watches(). This leaks a watch count, and repeated failures can exhaust the max_user_watches limit with -ENOSPC even when no watches are active. Prior to commit 1cce1eea0aff ("inotify: Convert to using per-namespace limits"), the watch count was incremented after fsnotify_add_mark_locked() succeeded, so this path was not affected. The conversion moved inc_inotify_watches() before the mark insertion without adding the corresponding rollback. Add the missing dec_inotify_watches() call in the error path.
Affected products and versions
| linux | linux_kernel · 4.11 → 5.10.258 |
|---|---|
| linux | linux_kernel · 5.11 → 5.15.209 |
| linux | linux_kernel · 5.16 → 6.1.175 |
| linux | linux_kernel · 6.13 → 6.18.27 |
| linux | linux_kernel · 6.19 → 7.0.4 |
| linux | linux_kernel · 6.2 → 6.6.140 |
| linux | linux_kernel · 6.7 → 6.12.86 |