CVE-2022-49290: mac80211: fix potential double free on mesh join

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: mac80211: fix potential double free on mesh join While commit 6a01afcf8468 ("mac80211: mesh: Free ie data when leaving mesh") fixed a memory leak on mesh leave / teardown it introduced a potential memory corruption caused by a double free when rejoining the mesh: ieee80211_leave_mesh() -> kfree(sdata->u.mesh.ie); ... ieee80211_join_mesh() -> copy_mesh_setup() -> old_ie = ifmsh->ie; -> kfree(old_ie); This double free / kernel panics can be reproduced by using wpa_supplicant with an encrypted mesh (if set up without encryption via "iw" then ifmsh->ie is always NULL, which avoids this issue). And then calling: $ iw dev mesh0 mesh leave $ iw dev mesh0 mesh join my-mesh Note that typically these commands are not used / working when using wpa_supplicant. And it seems that wpa_supplicant or wpa_cli are going through a NETDEV_DOWN/NETDEV_UP cycle between a mesh leave and mesh join where the NETDEV_UP resets the mesh.ie to NULL via a memcpy of default_mesh_setup in cfg80211_netdev_notifier_call, which then avoids the memory corruption, too. The issue was first observed in an application which was not using wpa_supplicant but "Senf" instead, which implements its own calls to nl80211. Fixing the issue by removing the kfree()'ing of the mesh IE in the mesh join function and leaving it solely up to the mesh leave to free the mesh IE.

Scores

CVSS scores of CVE-2022-49290, by who scored it
Scored by	CVSS	Score	Vector
LinuxCNA (assigner)	3.1	High7.8	CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
CISA-ADPADP (enrichment)	3.1	High7.8	CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
NVDNVD · Modified	3.1	High7.8	CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

EPSS (exploitation in 30 days): 0.26% · top 82% of all CVEs (7 Nov 2026)
CISA SSVC: Exploitation: none · Automatable: no · Technical impact: total

The list uses the assigner's score when there is one, then CISA's, then NVD's: High 7.8.

Weakness

CWE-415 Double Free (opens in a new tab)All about CWE-415 and its CVEs

Affected products

Linux · Linux
- affected 3212d6248faf0efce6b7a718e198feecce0eea05 – < 615716af8644813355e014314a0bc1e961250f5a
- affected 86e7d4cd2ed5f4b0188afce8199faffcf1ae7c7e – < c1d9c3628ef0a0ca197595d0f9e01cd3b5dda186
- affected 37bccfa89559a70c044b5ccde3c916a91388e14a – < 273ebddc5fda2967492cb0b6cdd7d81cfb821b76
- affected 3f15e3e62c80e180282f0cbc5559264e11c328b7 – < 3bbd0000d012f92aec423b224784fbf0f7bf40f8
- affected 6a01afcf8468d3ca2bd8bbb27503f60dcf643b20 – < 5d3ff9542a40ce034416bca03864709540a36016
- affected 6a01afcf8468d3ca2bd8bbb27503f60dcf643b20 – < 12e407a8ef17623823fd0c066fbd7f103953d28d
- affected 6a01afcf8468d3ca2bd8bbb27503f60dcf643b20 – < 582d8c60c0c053684f7138875e8150d5749ffc17
- affected 6a01afcf8468d3ca2bd8bbb27503f60dcf643b20 – < 46bb87d40683337757a2f902fcd4244b32bb4e86
- affected 6a01afcf8468d3ca2bd8bbb27503f60dcf643b20 – < 4a2d4496e15ea5bb5c8e83b94ca8ca7fb045e7d3
- affected 12e9cb1e7c93413112260991d094cfda712fdc97
- affected 4f3193e08602462a806e8f53212e79c60a6f7488
- affected 4.9.233 – < 4.9.309
- affected 4.14.192 – < 4.14.274
- affected 4.19.137 – < 4.19.237
- affected 5.4.56 – < 5.4.188
- affected 4.4.233 – < 4.5
- affected 5.7.13 – < 5.8
Linux · Linux
- affected 5.8
- unaffected < 5.8
- unaffected 4.9.309 – ≤ 4.9.*
- unaffected 4.14.274 – ≤ 4.14.*
- unaffected 4.19.237 – ≤ 4.19.*
- unaffected 5.4.188 – ≤ 5.4.*
- unaffected 5.10.109 – ≤ 5.10.*
- unaffected 5.15.32 – ≤ 5.15.*
- unaffected 5.16.18 – ≤ 5.16.*
- unaffected 5.17.1 – ≤ 5.17.*
- unaffected 5.18 – ≤ *

References (9)

Sources

The same CVE in the primary databases and aggregators, to check against.

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Record last updated 5 Aug 2026, 08:54 UTC.