Live › vulnerability › CVE-2026-98523
Go to dashboardWhen the initial framebuffer setup of the DRM fbdev client fails, the client stays registered, and closing the DRM file descriptor then restores a framebuffer that was never initialized. The result is a kernel warning and a NULL pointer dereference, which crashes the kernel.
Summary written from the sources below. Check the originals before acting.
First seen by InfraStack 2026-10-23 21:57 UTC. All times on this page are UTC.
Systems running a Linux kernel with the DRM subsystem and the fbdev client, where the initial framebuffer configuration fails. The sources do not say which kernel versions are fixed, so unknown. Hosts without a graphics driver loaded, and servers without a display stack, are unlikely to be affected, but the sources do not confirm this.
No product ranges from the sources yet.
Unknown from the sources.
Unknown from the sources.
Each row is the first time that source carried this signal. The analyst’s rows are its own findings.
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
drm/client: fix restore of partially initialized client
I got a null-ptr-deref report when closing a DRM file descriptor:
WARNING: drivers/gpu/drm/drm_atomic.c:2031 at __drm_atomic_helper_set_config+0x18e/0x1b0 [drm]
Call Trace: drm_client_modeset_commit_atomic+0x16b/0x220 [drm] drm_client_modeset_commit_locked+0x56/0x160 [drm] drm_client_modeset_commit+0x21/0x40 [drm] __drm_fb_helper_restore_fbdev_mode_unlocked.part.0+0x7b/0x80 drm_fbdev_client_restore+0xe/0x20 [drm_client_lib] drm_client_dev_restore+0x9f/0xc0 [drm] drm_release+0xc5/0xe0 [drm]
The warning is followed by a NULL pointer dereference:
BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference, address: 0000000000000008
RIP: __drm_fb_helper_restore_fbdev_mode_unlocked.part.0+0x41/0x80 [drm_kms_helper]
Call Trace: drm_fbdev_client_restore+0xe/0x20 [drm_client_lib] drm_client_dev_restore+0x9f/0xc0 [drm] drm_release+0xc5/0xe0 [drm] __fput+0xdc/0x2b0 __x64_sys_close+0x39/0x80 do_syscall_64+0x8d/0x460 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x76/0x7e
drm_client_register() adds the DRM client to the device client list before invoking the initial hotplug callback. If the hotplug callback fails, the client remains registered.
For the fbdev client, a failure during drm_fb_helper_initial_config() causes the partially initialized fbdev helper to be cleaned up. drm_fb_helper_fini() releases fb_helper->info and leaves it NULL.
The fbdev client therefore remains registered even though there is no fully initialized framebuffer device.
Later, when userspace closes the DRM file descriptor, drm_release() can invoke the restore callbacks of registered DRM clients:
drm_release() drm_client_dev_restore() drm_fbdev_client_restore() drm_fb_helper_restore_fbdev_mode_unlocked()
drm_fbdev_client_restore() currently restores the fbdev state unconditionally. For a partially initialized fbdev client this can submit an incomplete modeset state and subsequently access fbdev state which has not been initialized, resulting in the warning and NULL pointer dereference above.
drm_fbdev_client_unregister() already uses fb_helper->info to distinguish a fully probed framebuffer device from a partially initialized client.
Use the same condition in drm_fbdev_client_restore() and skip restore if no framebuffer device has been successfully initialized.
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