CVE-2026-46040

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: inotify: fix watch count leak when fsnotify_add_inode_mark_locked() fails When fsnotify_add_inode_mark_locked() fails in inotify_new_watch(), the error path calls inotify_remove_from_idr() but does not call dec_inotify_watches() to undo the preceding inc_inotify_watches(). This leaks a watch count, and repeated failures can exhaust the max_user_watches limit with -ENOSPC even when no watches are active. Prior to commit 1cce1eea0aff ("inotify: Convert to using per-namespace limits"), the watch count was incremented after fsnotify_add_mark_locked() succeeded, so this path was not affected. The conversion moved inc_inotify_watches() before the mark insertion without adding the corresponding rollback. Add the missing dec_inotify_watches() call in the error path.

• linux linux kernel (>= 4.11 < 5.10.258) • linux linux kernel (>= 5.11 < 5.15.209) • linux linux kernel (>= 5.16 < 6.1.175) • linux linux kernel (>= 6.2 < 6.6.140) • linux linux kernel (>= 6.7 < 6.12.86) • linux linux kernel (>= 6.13 < 6.18.27) • linux linux kernel (>= 6.19 < 7.0.4)