← CVE index
Vulnerability record/PUBLISHED/Published Nov 3, 2026 11:25:14 UTC

CVE-2026-99256

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: dm cache: fix issue with background work locking dm cache used a rw_semaphore for background_work_lock. Write locks on rw_semaphores have strict owner semantics, but there was no guarantee that the process that locked background_work_lock was the same process that unlocked it. This can be easily seen using a kernel compiled with CONFIG_DEBUG_RWSEMS. Given a dm cache device <cache>, run: 'dmsetup suspend <cache> && dmsetup resume <cache>'. This will trigger a kernel warning: DEBUG_RWSEMS_WARN_ON((rwsem_owner(sem) != current) && !rwsem_test_oflags(sem, RWSEM_NONSPINNABLE)) triggered by cache_resume(). To fix this, switch from a rw_semaphore to a spinlock and a wait queue. dm cache already has a wait queue and associated counter, migration_wait and nr_allocated_migrations, that was getting woken up when background work was getting completed, but wasn't actually used by anything. This is replaced by the background_work queue and counter.

Base scoreN/A/ 10
SeverityNoneCVSS unscored

Exploitability / impact

CVSS metric breakdown

Vector-derived attributes
Base severityNone
No CVSS vector is available for this record.

CVSS communicates standardized severity and impact characteristics. It does not establish whether a system is exploitable in your specific environment.

Record context

CVE Numbering AuthorityLinux
Last updatedNov 3, 2026 11:40:45 UTC
PublishedNov 3, 2026 11:25:14 UTC
ReservedSep 25, 2026 10:25:14 UTC