Impact
The Linux multitouch driver misinterprets the single unsigned long mt_io_flags as a per‑slot bitmap, allowing a device that reports a large contact count to write beyond the intended word. This corrupts adjacent fields of the device structure, leading to a null pointer dereference in a timer context and causing a kernel panic. The flaw requires no local privileges and can be triggered by any untrusted USB or Bluetooth HID multitouch device.
Affected Systems
All Linux kernels that do not include the patch fixing the out‑of‑bounds bit access are vulnerable. The issue resides in the HID multitouch driver, so any system running a kernel that supports multitouch functionality over USB or Bluetooth and has not yet applied the recent commit is affected.
Risk and Exploitability
The CVSS score of 8.8 denotes high severity, but the EPSS score is less than 1% and the vulnerability is not listed in the CISA KEV catalog, indicating a low current exploitation probability. An attacker can trigger the crash simply by connecting a multitouch device advertising up to 255 contacts; no privilege escalation is needed. The primary impact is a kernel panic, effectively causing denial of service until the system is rebooted.
OpenCVE Enrichment
Debian DLA
Debian DSA
Ubuntu USN