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High · 7.5 CVE-2026-52945 EUVD-2026-38813GHSA-rh26-99wm-wg2w

Revert "wireguard: device: enable threaded NAPI"

Published Jun 24, 2026 · Updated Oct 19, 2026 · Assigned by Linux

Vendor: Linux Product: Linux Package: linux Package: linux Package: linux-allwinner-5.19 Package: linux-aws Package: linux-aws-5.0 Package: linux-aws-5.11 Package: linux-aws-5.13 Package: linux-aws-5.19 Package: linux-aws-5.3 Package: linux-aws-5.8 Package: linux-aws-6.14 Package: linux-aws-6.17 Package: linux-aws-6.2 Package: linux-aws-6.5 Package: linux-azure Package: linux-azure-5.11 Package: linux-azure-5.13 Package: linux-azure-5.19 Package: linux-azure-5.3 Package: linux-azure-5.8 Package: linux-azure-6.11 Package: linux-azure-6.14 Package: linux-azure-6.17 Package: linux-azure-6.2 Package: linux-azure-6.5 Package: linux-azure-edge Package: linux-azure-fde Package: linux-azure-fde-5.19 Package: linux-azure-fde-6.14 Package: linux-azure-fde-6.17 Package: linux-azure-fde-6.2 Package: linux-azure-nvidia-6.14 Package: linux-gcp Package: linux-gcp-5.11 Package: linux-gcp-5.13 Package: linux-gcp-5.19 Package: linux-gcp-5.3 Package: linux-gcp-5.8 Package: linux-gcp-6.11 Package: linux-gcp-6.14 Package: linux-gcp-6.17 Package: linux-gcp-6.2 Package: linux-gcp-6.5 Package: linux-gke Package: linux-gke-4.15 Package: linux-gke-5.15 Package: linux-gke-5.4 Package: linux-gkeop Package: linux-gkeop-5.15 Package: linux-gkeop-5.4 Package: linux-hwe Package: linux-hwe-5.11 Package: linux-hwe-5.13 Package: linux-hwe-5.19 Package: linux-hwe-5.8 Package: linux-hwe-6.11 Package: linux-hwe-6.14 Package: linux-hwe-6.2 Package: linux-hwe-6.5 Package: linux-hwe-edge Package: linux-intel-5.13 Package: linux-intel-iot-realtime Package: linux-lowlatency-hwe-5.19 Package: linux-lowlatency-hwe-6.11 Package: linux-lowlatency-hwe-6.2 Package: linux-lowlatency-hwe-6.5 Package: linux-nvidia-6.11 Package: linux-nvidia-6.17 Package: linux-nvidia-6.2 Package: linux-nvidia-6.5 Package: linux-oem Package: linux-oem-5.10 Package: linux-oem-5.13 Package: linux-oem-5.14 Package: linux-oem-5.17 Package: linux-oem-5.6 Package: linux-oem-6.0 Package: linux-oem-6.1 Package: linux-oem-6.11 Package: linux-oem-6.14 Package: linux-oem-6.5 Package: linux-oem-6.8 Package: linux-oracle Package: linux-oracle-5.0 Package: linux-oracle-5.11 Package: linux-oracle-5.13 Package: linux-oracle-5.3 Package: linux-oracle-5.8 Package: linux-oracle-6.14 Package: linux-oracle-6.17 Package: linux-oracle-6.5 Package: linux-raspi Package: linux-raspi-realtime Package: linux-raspi2 Package: linux-realtime Package: linux-realtime-6.14 Package: linux-realtime-6.17 Package: linux-riscv Package: linux-riscv-5.11 Package: linux-riscv-5.19 Package: linux-riscv-5.8 Package: linux-riscv-6.14 Package: linux-riscv-6.17 Package: linux-riscv-6.5 Package: linux-starfive-5.19 Package: linux-starfive-6.2 Package: linux-starfive-6.5 Package: linux-vmware Platform: Linux Ecosystem: Debian Ecosystem: Ubuntu

Description

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

Revert "wireguard: device: enable threaded NAPI"

This reverts commit 933466fc50a8e4eb167acbd0d8ec96a078462e9c which is
commit db9ae3b6b43c79b1ba87eea849fd65efa05b4b2e upstream.

We have had three independent production user reports in combination
with Cilium utilizing WireGuard as encryption underneath that k8s Pod
E/W traffic to certain peer nodes fully stalled. The situation appears
as follows:

- Occurs very rarely but at random times under heavy networking load.
- Once the issue triggers the decryption side stops working completely
for that WireGuard peer, other peers keep working fine. The stall
happens also for newly initiated connections towards that particular
WireGuard peer.
- Only the decryption side is affected, never the encryption side.
- Once it triggers, it never recovers and remains in this state,
the CPU/mem on that node looks normal, no leak, busy loop or crash.
- bpftrace on the affected system shows that wg_prev_queue_enqueue
fails, thus the MAX_QUEUED_PACKETS (1024 skbs!) for the peer's
rx_queue is reached.
- Also, bpftrace shows that wg_packet_rx_poll for that peer is never
called again after reaching this state for that peer. For other
peers wg_packet_rx_poll does get called normally.
- Commit db9ae3b ("wireguard: device: enable threaded NAPI")
switched WireGuard to threaded NAPI by default. The default has
not been changed for triggering the issue, neither did CPU
hotplugging occur (i.e. 5bd8de2 ("wireguard: queueing: always
return valid online CPU in wg_cpumask_choose_online()")).
- The issue has been observed with stable kernels of v5.15 as well as
v6.1. It was reported to us that v5.10 stable is working fine, and
no report on v6.6 stable either (somewhat related discussion in [0]
though).
- In the WireGuard driver the only material difference between v5.10
stable and v5.15 stable is the switch to threaded NAPI by default.

[0] https://lore.kernel.org/netdev/CA+wXwBTT74RErDGAnj98PqS=wvdh8eM1pi4q6tTdExtjnokKqA@mail.gmail.com/

Breakdown of the problem:

1) skbs arriving for decryption are enqueued to the peer->rx_queue in
wg_packet_consume_data via wg_queue_enqueue_per_device_and_peer.
2) The latter only moves the skb into the MPSC peer queue if it does
not surpass MAX_QUEUED_PACKETS (1024) which is kept track in an
atomic counter via wg_prev_queue_enqueue.
3) In case enqueueing was successful, the skb is also queued up
in the device queue, round-robin picks a next online CPU, and
schedules the decryption worker.
4) The wg_packet_decrypt_worker, once scheduled, picks these up
from the queue, decrypts the packets and once done calls into
wg_queue_enqueue_per_peer_rx.
5) The latter updates the state to PACKET_STATE_CRYPTED on success
and calls napi_schedule on the per peer->napi instance.
6) NAPI then polls via wg_packet_rx_poll. wg_prev_queue_peek checks
on the peer->rx_queue. It will wg_prev_queue_dequeue if the
queue->peeked skb was not cached yet, or just return the latter
otherwise. (wg_prev_queue_drop_peeked later clears the cache.)
7) From an ordering perspective, the peer->rx_queue has skbs in order
while the device queue with the per-CPU worker threads from a
global ordering PoV can finish the decryption and signal the skb
PACKET_STATE_CRYPTED out of order.
8) A situation can be observed that the first packet coming in will
be stuck waiting for the decryption worker to be scheduled for
a longer time when the system is under pressure.
9) While this is the case, the other CPUs in the meantime finish
decryption and call into napi_schedule.
10) Now in wg_packet_rx_poll it picks up the first in-order skb
from the peer->rx_queue and sees that its state is still
PACKET_STATE_UNCRYPTED. The NAPI poll routine then exits e
---truncated---

Affected products

VendorProductAffectedFixed
Linux Linux 6.15.3 – < 6.16, 5.15.186 – < 5.15.201, 6.1.142 – < 6.1.164, 6.6.94 – < 6.6.127, 6.12.34 – < 6.12.74 6.16

Fixed in Linux distributions

Distributions backport fixes, so the version that fixes this vulnerability differs per release — upgrade to at least the version shown. From the distributions' security trackers and advisories.

ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Debian 13 linux 6.12.74-1 —
Debian 12 linux 6.1.164-1 —
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Ubuntu 25.10 linux +8 No fix yet —
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-riscv +25 No fix yet —
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-riscv +32 No fix yet —
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS linux-gke +28 No fix yet —
Ubuntu 18.04 LTS linux-gcp +14 No fix yet —
Show 2 more (older releases, extended support, other products)
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Ubuntu 16.04 LTS linux-hwe-edge No fix yet —
Ubuntu Pro Realtime 24.04 LTS linux-realtime-6.14 +1 No fix yet —
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
RHEL 10 rv +76 6.12.0-264.9.1.el10_3 RHSA-2026:97040
RHEL 9 rv +75 5.14.0-741.14.1.el9_9 RHSA-2026:97435
Show 2 more (older releases, extended support, other products)
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
RHEL 10.2 EUS rv +76 6.12.0-211.75.1.el10_2 RHSA-2026:99139
RHEL 9.8 EUS rv +75 5.14.0-687.67.1.el9_8 RHSA-2026:99148

Amazon Linux

ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Amazon Linux 2023 kernel-livepatch-6.12.74-98.124 +1 1:1.0-0.amzn2023 ALAS2023-2026-1491, ALAS2023-2026-1489
Amazon Linux 2023 perf +14 1:6.1.164-196.303.amzn2023 ALAS2023-2026-1491
Amazon Linux 2023 perf6.12 +14 1:6.12.74-98.124.amzn2023 ALAS2023-2026-1489

Advisories 7

References