In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: cifs: validate DFS referral string offsets parse_dfs_referrals() validates that the response header and referral array fit in the received buffer, but each referral also contains string offsets supplied by the server. Those offsets are used to compute the DfsPath and NetworkAddress string pointers without checking whether they still point inside the response buffer. A malformed referral can therefore make the computed pointer exceed the end of the buffer. The resulting negative max_len is then passed to cifs_strndup_from_utf16(), and the non-Unicode path forwards it to kstrndup() as a size_t, allowing strnlen() to read out of bounds. Validate each string offset before deriving the string pointer.

The Unity Linux 20 host has a package installed that is affected by a vulnerability as referenced in the UTSA-2026-105550 advisory.

    In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

    cifs: validate DFS referral string offsets

    parse_dfs_referrals() validates that the response header and referral     array fit in the received buffer, but each referral also contains string     offsets supplied by the server.

    Those offsets are used to compute the DfsPath and NetworkAddress string     pointers without checking whether they still point inside the response     buffer. A malformed referral can therefore make the computed pointer     exceed the end of the buffer. The resulting negative max_len is then     passed to cifs_strndup_from_utf16(), and the non-Unicode path forwards it     to kstrndup() as a size_t, allowing strnlen() to read out of bounds.

    Validate each string offset before deriving the string pointer.

Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Unity Linux security advisory.

Note that Nessus has not tested for this issue but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed that are impacted by a vulnerability without a vendor supplied patch available.

  - cifs: validate DFS referral string offsets parse_dfs_referrals() validates that the response header and     referral array fit in the received buffer, but each referral also contains string offsets supplied by the     server. Those offsets are used to compute the DfsPath and NetworkAddress string pointers without checking     whether they still point inside the response buffer. A malformed referral can therefore make the computed     pointer exceed the end of the buffer. The resulting negative max_len is then passed to     cifs_strndup_from_utf16(), and the non-Unicode path forwards it to kstrndup() as a size_t, allowing     strnlen() to read out of bounds. Validate each string offset before deriving the string pointer.
    (CVE-2026-72318)

Note that Nessus relies on the presence of the package as reported by the vendor.

An update of the linux package has been released.

ID	Name	Product	Family	Type	Severity
343049	Oracle Linux 10 / 9 : Unbreakable Enterprise kernel (ELSA-2026-500248)	Nessus	Oracle Linux Local Security Checks	Local	high
342540	Unity Linux 20.1070e Security Update: kernel (UTSA-2026-105550)	Nessus	Unity Linux Local Security Checks	Local	critical
341880	Amazon Linux 2023 : bpftool6.18, kernel6.18, kernel6.18-devel (ALAS2023-2026-2071)	Nessus	Amazon Linux Local Security Checks	Local	medium
337239	Amazon Linux 2023 : bpftool6.12, kernel6.12, kernel6.12-devel (ALAS2023-2026-2057)	Nessus	Amazon Linux Local Security Checks	Local	medium
337226	Amazon Linux 2023 : bpftool, kernel, kernel-devel (ALAS2023-2026-2058)	Nessus	Amazon Linux Local Security Checks	Local	medium
335633	Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2026-72318	Nessus	Misc.	Local	critical
334784	Photon OS 5.0: Linux PHSA-2026-5.0-92-0952	Nessus	PhotonOS Local Security Checks	Local	high

Detections

Analytics

CVE-2026-72318

critical

Tenable Plugins

high

critical

medium

medium

medium

critical

high