Red Hat issued Important updates for CVE-2022-4744, a CVSS 7.8 double-free vulnerability in the Linux kernel TUN/TAP driver. When network-device registration fails during NETDEV_REGISTER notifier handling, the tun_free_netdev cleanup path can free memory twice. A local low-privileged user can trigger the failure by attempting to create a TUN device named default or all, names reserved in /proc/sys/net/ipv4/conf/, potentially causing a denial of service or escalating privileges. The upstream fix is commit 158b515f703e.
The affected and reproducibly exploitable path was identified in RHEL 9; Red Hat released updated standard and real-time kernels through RHSA-2023:1470 and RHSA-2023:1469, plus the rebootless kpatch-patch live patch in RHSA-2023:1471. Updates cover RHEL 9 deployments across x86_64, ARM64, s390x, and ppc64le, including applicable EUS, AUS, SAP, and lifecycle channels. Organizations should install the relevant kernel update and reboot, or deploy the live patch where supported; preventing the tun module from loading is a possible interim mitigation when operationally feasible.

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Red Hat issued RHSA-2023:1467 for the kernel-rt package on RHEL 9.0 Update Services for SAP Solutions, fixing CVE-2022-4744 in the Linux TUN driver's tun_free_netdev path. The update supplies kernel-rt version 5.14.0-70.50.2.rt21.122.el9_0 and requires a reboot to take effect.
Red Hat issued updates for RHEL 9 and RHEL 9.0 Extended Update Support that fixed CVE-2022-4744, including RHSA-2023:1469, RHSA-2023:1470, and RHSA-2023:1471 for kernel-rt, kernel, and kpatch-patch packages. The releases also included RHEL 9.0 EUS kernel, kernel-rt, and live-patch updates; conventional kernel updates required a reboot, while the kpatch module loads through its post-install script.
Red Hat issued RHSA-2024:1404, providing a CVE-2022-4744 fix for the RHEL 8.8 Extended Update Support kernel.
Red Hat issued RHSA-2023:6901 for the RHEL 8 kernel-rt package and RHSA-2023:7077 for the RHEL 8 kernel package, addressing CVE-2022-4744.
Fedora remediated CVE-2022-4744 through its 5.15.12 stable kernel updates and tracked the issue as bug 2180939.
Upstream Linux addressed CVE-2022-4744 with commit 158b515f703e, "tun: avoid double free in tun_free_netdev." The flaw could be triggered through a failed register_netdevice() path, including by using reserved device names such as "default" or "all."
Jann Horn of Google Project Zero reported CVE-2022-4744, a double-free vulnerability in the Linux kernel TUN/TAP device driver that can occur when device registration fails during NETDEV_REGISTER notifier handling.
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