{"id":"CVE-2026-12631","state":"PUBLISHED","title":"Broken access-control denial in k_thread_join/k_thread_abort syscall validation in Zephyr kernel","description":"The Zephyr kernel validates the k_thread_join() and k_thread_abort() system calls (declared __syscall in include/zephyr/kernel.h) through thread_obj_validate() in kernel/thread.c. Its default switch branch is the access-denied path, taken when k_object_validate() returns -EPERM (the calling user thread was never granted access to the target thread object) or -EBADF (the supplied pointer is not a registered kernel object of the right type). That branch invoked K_OOPS(K_SYSCALL_VERIFY_MSG(ret, \"access denied\")), but K_SYSCALL_VERIFY_MSG treats a true expression as success; the non-zero error code ret therefore read as \"verified OK\", the kernel oops was never raised, and control fell through to CODE_UNREACHABLE.\n\nBecause k_thread_join() and k_thread_abort() are system calls, an unprivileged user-mode thread (under CONFIG_USERSPACE) can reach this denial path directly by calling either syscall on a thread object it does not own. Instead of the offending thread being cleanly terminated, execution reaches __builtin_unreachable() while running in supervisor mode inside the syscall handler.\n\nOn Clang builds CODE_UNREACHABLE emits an illegal-instruction trap, so a user thread can deterministically crash the kernel — a locally triggerable denial of service that escapes the userspace sandbox. On GCC builds the path is undefined behavior: the compiler may drop the return-value handling for thread_obj_validate(), so it can return an undefined bool; if that is false, the caller proceeds into the real k_thread_join()/k_thread_abort() implementation for a thread the user was never authorized to access, an access-control bypass.\n\nThe fix changes the verification expression to ret == 0, so a denied (non-zero) result now correctly raises K_OOPS and terminates the offending caller.","publishedAt":"2026-08-18T20:55:42.859Z","updatedAt":"2026-08-19T13:18:03.745Z","severity":{"score":6.5,"label":"Medium","version":"3.1","vector":"CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:N/A:H","source":"zephyr"},"assigner":"zephyr","products":["zephyrproject zephyr"],"affected":[{"vendor":"zephyrproject","product":"zephyr","packageName":"zephyr","defaultStatus":"unaffected","versions":[{"version":"2.3.0","status":"affected","lessThan":"4.4.2","versionType":"semver"}],"collectionURL":"https://github.com/zephyrproject-rtos/zephyr","programFiles":["kernel/thread.c"]}],"references":["https://github.com/zephyrproject-rtos/zephyr/commit/bd1828652dfc217ba9f3a2221a7499cd8914ed9c","https://github.com/zephyrproject-rtos/zephyr/security/advisories/GHSA-crfw-75jw-hjm3"],"weaknesses":["CWE-862"],"ingestedAt":"2026-10-29T20:10:52.580Z","source":{"repository":"CVEProject/cvelistV5","path":"cves/2026/12xxx/CVE-2026-12631.json","commit":"556c9d3a8cd17e218bb8e452ba7cd619a384ff47"},"raw":{"dataType":"CVE_RECORD","dataVersion":"5.2","cveMetadata":{"cveId":"CVE-2026-12631","state":"PUBLISHED","datePublished":"2026-08-18T20:55:42.859Z","dateUpdated":"2026-08-19T13:18:03.745Z","assignerShortName":"zephyr","assignerOrgId":"e2e69745-5e70-4e92-8431-deb5529a81ad","dateReserved":"2026-06-18T15:22:26.927Z"},"containers":{"cna":{"title":"Broken access-control denial in k_thread_join/k_thread_abort syscall validation in Zephyr kernel","descriptions":[{"lang":"en","value":"The Zephyr kernel validates the k_thread_join() and k_thread_abort() system calls (declared __syscall in include/zephyr/kernel.h) through thread_obj_validate() in kernel/thread.c. Its default switch branch is the access-denied path, taken when k_object_validate() returns -EPERM (the calling user thread was never granted access to the target thread object) or -EBADF (the supplied pointer is not a registered kernel object of the right type). That branch invoked K_OOPS(K_SYSCALL_VERIFY_MSG(ret, \"access denied\")), but K_SYSCALL_VERIFY_MSG treats a true expression as success; the non-zero error code ret therefore read as \"verified OK\", the kernel oops was never raised, and control fell through to CODE_UNREACHABLE.\n\nBecause k_thread_join() and k_thread_abort() are system calls, an unprivileged user-mode thread (under CONFIG_USERSPACE) can reach this denial path directly by calling either syscall on a thread object it does not own. Instead of the offending thread being cleanly terminated, execution reaches __builtin_unreachable() while running in supervisor mode inside the syscall handler.\n\nOn Clang builds CODE_UNREACHABLE emits an illegal-instruction trap, so a user thread can deterministically crash the kernel — a locally triggerable denial of service that escapes the userspace sandbox. On GCC builds the path is undefined behavior: the compiler may drop the return-value handling for thread_obj_validate(), so it can return an undefined bool; if that is false, the caller proceeds into the real k_thread_join()/k_thread_abort() implementation for a thread the user was never authorized to access, an access-control bypass.\n\nThe fix changes the verification expression to ret == 0, so a denied (non-zero) result now correctly raises K_OOPS and terminates the offending caller."}],"affected":[{"vendor":"zephyrproject","product":"zephyr","packageName":"zephyr","defaultStatus":"unaffected","versions":[{"version":"2.3.0","status":"affected","lessThan":"4.4.2","versionType":"semver"}],"collectionURL":"https://github.com/zephyrproject-rtos/zephyr","programFiles":["kernel/thread.c"]}],"references":[{"url":"https://github.com/zephyrproject-rtos/zephyr/commit/bd1828652dfc217ba9f3a2221a7499cd8914ed9c","name":"Fix commit","tags":["patch"]},{"url":"https://github.com/zephyrproject-rtos/zephyr/security/advisories/GHSA-crfw-75jw-hjm3","name":"GHSA-crfw-75jw-hjm3"}],"metrics":[{"format":"CVSS","cvssV3_1":{"version":"3.1","vectorString":"CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:N/A:H","baseScore":6.5,"baseSeverity":"MEDIUM"}}],"problemTypes":[{"descriptions":[{"cweId":"CWE-862","lang":"en","description":"auth","type":"CWE"}]}],"providerMetadata":{"shortName":"zephyr","orgId":"e2e69745-5e70-4e92-8431-deb5529a81ad","dateUpdated":"2026-08-18T20:55:42.859Z"},"x_generator":{"engine":"cvelib 1.8.0"}},"adp":[{"title":"CISA ADP Vulnrichment","metrics":[{"other":{"type":"ssvc","content":{"timestamp":"2026-08-19T13:17:32.022813Z","id":"CVE-2026-12631","options":[{"Exploitation":"none"},{"Automatable":"no"},{"Technical Impact":"partial"}],"role":"CISA Coordinator","version":"2.0.3"}}}],"providerMetadata":{"shortName":"CISA-ADP","orgId":"134c704f-9b21-4f2e-91b3-4a467353bcc0","dateUpdated":"2026-08-19T13:18:03.745Z"}}]}}}