CVE-2026-98542

A flaw was found in the Linux kernel's cpuset subsystem, which can lead to a denial of service (DoS) or compromised resource isolation. A local user with permissions to configure control groups (cgroups) can trigger this flaw by creating a remote partition that requests processor cores already allocated to an ancestor partition. Because the kernel fails to reject the conflicting request, multiple partitions can improperly claim exclusive access to the same central processing unit (CPU) cores, generating kernel warnings and causing inconsistent resource management.

This vulnerability is rated as having a Low impact because triggering it requires high administrative privileges to configure cgroup v2 cpuset partition hierarchies. In standard Red Hat Enterprise Linux environments, delegating partition-level cpuset controls to unprivileged workloads is uncommon. Successful exploitation merely results in a non-fatal kernel warning and inconsistent CPU core allocation across conflicting partitions, rather than a system crash or privilege escalation.

The CVSS score(s) listed for this vulnerability do not reflect the associated product's status, and are included for informational purposes to better understand the severity of this vulnerability.