New CIFSwitch Linux flaw grants local root access
๐ก๏ธ A local privilege escalation named CIFSwitch in the Linux kernel allows forging of CIFS authentication key descriptions and abuse of the kernel key request flow, enabling root privilege escalation. The vulnerability affects kernels paired with vulnerable cifs-utils (6.14+) on several major distributions when user namespaces and permissive SELinux/AppArmor settings are present. The attacker can trigger a privileged cifs.upcall to trust attacker-controlled fields, force a namespace switch, and load a malicious NSS module before privilege drop. A kernel patch validating cifs.spnego request origins is available upstream; mitigations include disabling the CIFS module, removing cifs-utils, and disabling unprivileged user namespaces.