> Why is this CVE high priority?
> See ubuntu cvss score
That's it, we don't even get a period on this TBD of a sentence. It's followed by a generic link that explains what "Ubuntu Priority" is, but that page contradicts their choice. Note that it doesn't offer any mitigations either, and even the (horrendously unclear) description is copied from the NIST page, so there's no actual message from Ubuntu.
I already had a bad feeling the first time I saw "Get more security updates through Ubuntu Pro" on `apt upgrade`, this is now the kick I needed to move to a different distro.
[0] https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2026-98432#priority-reason
Some of my clients may be surprised by this change, as I once advocated for Ubuntu as a good choice for a development and deployment platform. While that has not been true for quite a while, they have now jumped the shark into eel-infested waters; I cannot take them seriously any longer.
I took the lazy route with my most recent machine and installed Mint since I wanted to use it for light gaming. I'm going to redo it with Nix sometime soon because the value prop simply isn't there.
They can pay for Debian support! (I’m not 100% sure who they should go to, but e.g. Freexian are doing Extended LTS for Debian [1], so I suppose they could do a regular support contract as well?)
[1] https://docs.oracle.com/en-us/iaas/Content/Compute/Reference...
And this is how Ubuntu describes the vulnerability to sysadmins:
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
ipv4: free inet_opt and ireq_opt after an RCU grace period
tcp_v4_syn_recv_sock() transfers ownership of ireq->ireq_opt to the
child socket (newinet->inet_opt) without copying it.
Another cpu can concurrently process a retransmitted SYN for the same
request socket, and send a SYNACK from tcp_check_req().
tcp_v4_send_synack() and inet_csk_route_req() read ireq->ireq_opt
under rcu_read_lock() only, and ip_build_and_send_pkt() and
ip_options_build() then read opt->optlen twice.
Note that the SYNACK timer itself is not an issue: it holds a
reference on its request socket, and inet_csk_reqsk_queue_drop()
calls timer_delete_sync() before the child can be freed.
Since commit 079096f103fa (“tcp/dccp: install syn_recv requests
into ehash table”), request sockets are processed without holding
the listener lock, so nothing prevents the child socket from being
freed while the SYNACK is still being built. TCP child sockets do
not have SOCK_RCU_FREE, and inet_sock_destruct() frees inet_opt
with a plain kfree(), leading to a use-after-free in
ip_options_build().
A similar issue exists with request socket migration
(net.ipv4.tcp_migrate_req=1, or a BPF_SK_REUSEPORT_SELECT_OR_MIGRATE
program). reqsk_timer_handler() clones the request socket with
inet_reqsk_clone(), so that the old request socket and its clone
share the same ireq_opt, then reqsk_migrate_reset() clears the
pointer in the old one. Another cpu holding a reference on the old
request socket can still be using these options (sending a SYNACK,
or creating a child in tcp_v4_syn_recv_sock()) when the clone is
freed, and tcp_v4_reqsk_destructor() also uses a plain kfree().
Readers already use RCU, and other paths replacing inet_opt
(do_ip_setsockopt(), cipso_v4_sock_setattr()...) already use
kfree_rcu(). Use kfree_rcu() in inet_sock_destruct() and
tcp_v4_reqsk_destructor() as well.
IPv6 is not affected by the first issue, because tcp_v6_syn_recv_sock()
duplicates the options. tcp_v6_reqsk_destructor() has the same
migration issue with ipv6_opt, which is only set by CALIPSO. This
will be addressed in a separate patch.
I assume this is unrelated to the Ubuntu situation, but how does a grammar checker go down? We've been doing offline grammar checking since computers had 64K of RAM.
Agreed! I know this is a bad month, but this is poor form from several vendors that tout "we'll handle XYZ aspect of security for you".
I don't remember why exactly but it was definitely just 'linux VPS = Ubuntu' for a long time. I think they got reputation as being the 'just works' option because they were happier to include some non-free graphics drivers etc where Debian was the more pure option but most end users didn't care
But since they added snap and I started running into issues with trying to install Docker etc a few years ago I default to Debian now and most of the time I don't even know which it is.
And don't get me started with Debian testing. I want a LTS distro not a testing one.
And Ubuntu 24.04 LTS is using 6.8.
Ubuntu releases a new version every six months, but an LTS — which is probably what most people run in production — only every two years. Debian releases come out every two years.
So if you only run Ubuntu LTS, the release cadence is the same as Debian.
Which only came out a few months ago, and which only recently released its .1, so the do-release-upgrade message only recently appeared for most people.
I'd be interested to know how many folks have changed their current production over to 26TLS in the last six months. I'm guessing not a lot.
So yes, there is a newer LTS, but what is its current market share as compared to 24 TLS (or even 22LTS)?
Ubuntu releases its LTSes in even years, and Debian does its releases in odd years:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debian_release_version_history...
It's not 'as supported', sure, but I'll also note that wifi, at least, has worked on pretty much every modern laptop which I have installed Debian upon.
(I mean nothing is 100% but I've been mixing packages for like 2 decades now and literally can't remember any specific trouble resulting from it.)
You either want to have the new stuff or LTS. You can't have both.
Why not just install a newer Linux version from the official backports repository if you need it?
If you want real testing, you should run "unstable". If you're in for fun, try experimental.
Running Testing on my desktops and stable on my servers since forever. None of them broke, none of them created problems.
I don't care Stable running 6.x.x. It gets security updates in less than 24h, and is applied automatically before I wake up, and doesn't ship coreutils with 104CVEs, just because it's Rust.
However, while Testing is "relatively secure", it's never "Server secure". I'd never use testing or testing packages in stable or any server for that matter.
Again. Stable is for servers, testing is for personal use.
I never argued otherwise, ever.
I have to add that for me, testing definitely breaks stuff sometimes. Nothing beyond my ability to fix, though. Nothing beyond anyone's ability now that AI is around.
That's interesting, can you give an example? Asking as a curious Debian user.
They also had credible commitments to long term support that brought people on board. I think that was enough to get them on the map, but personally as a desktop user, I haven't used it in a while, mostly sticking to Debian and Arch.
Ubuntu found me (finally, with the tutorialhelp of a localLLM) in 2026, and I don't trust most of the opt-outs.
Now my friends don't have trouble calling doctors, but can't set up port forwarding (not like any games require it anymore).
Surprised how many answers here are on "social" reasons, and ignoring that Ubuntu does provide genuine additions to Debian.
Ubuntu includes additional proprietary drivers to Debian. So there are legitimate hardware cases were Ubuntu will work out the box and Debian won't. I can't speak for how many people need those drivers, and how much of choice is down to defaults/inertia etc.
From hearing interviews with PopOS folk, I think this is also a big reason people choose Ubuntu as a base for a lot of Distros instead of Debian.
What are the numbers of people still installing servers on the real hardware and needing these proprietary drivers?
Is AI changing the game where more people want bare metal and GPUs with proprietor drivers?
A fair few years ago I did run Ubuntu on my desktop and laptop when I wanted some more similarity with my servers which ran Debian.
And similar breakdowns with Fedora/RHEL.
But Ubuntu or Fedora on a server? No thanks.
A gradually increasing number of popular userland applications have been publishing their own apt repositories however so this is less of a problem now than it used to be.
Over the years though I've found that I much prefer Debian's relative stability and more thoughtful, if slightly plodding, release cadence.
I'm on Kubuntu (home installs) but have been looking to move since Ubuntu went over to Snaps and started breaking everything (MX looks most likely for me). The task of moving the family over is stopping me; I've been using Kubuntu for a very long time now.
I may be biased as a Debian user, but if Ubuntu now reacts slower than Debian this may push some people to reconsider their choice.
That's just some rough reasoning in my head.
Also when you install third-party software, 100% of them will support Ubuntu. That's more about workstation usage, though. But having tested platform matters.
I feel like we're close to a post-distro era of operating systems though. My ansible playbook customizes so much already it wouldn't take too much more to just start from debian tbh.
Either way, I just wanted to note you can use APT to include Mozilla's Firefox and Thunderbird repo. That way, you get a .deb from them.
One specific thing I like about Ubuntu: I know a new version gets released every six months (I believe OpenBSD innovated this?) and the version is recognized by date. The LTS is released every two years around april in the even years. Otherwise it is april/october.
They changed that a few years ago, but plausibly the underlying prioritization of end-user experience is still lower than Ubuntu's degree of user focus.
I still wish Mark would rename his company "Ubuntu". He's a great guy, the company does great work, but I keep getting undeserved credit for it because we wouldn't sell him the domain name.
I might be moving over to Rocky Linux 10.
Five years of guaranteed updates, with an option to pay for another five years ticks the box for accreditors and the like.
The much vaguer Debian policy that a release will be supported for some undetermined period based on how frequently they release, and then get some kind of volunteer-based LTS support for a couple of years after that, and then maybe further through some third-party ELTS program is a much harder sell.
Debian used to move a bit slow in terms of userspace, and that's true, but for servers, that's a non-issue for the last 20 years or so (from my experience).
On the Desktop side, Fedora and Ubuntu moves faster on the userspace front, but if your system is behind a NAT, and you know what you're doing, Debian Testing is just as good, more stable and it's rolling (except when it's feature freeze, but a stable workhorse is better than a shiny but breaking one).
Debian allows me to sleep well at night, provides guaranteed updates, and works rock solid all-round, so I won't be touching Ubuntu for the foreseeable future. Esp, with controversial choices like uutils, etc.
I moved all my new server/service deployments back to Debian around 2021/2022 (bullseye era).
I'm on an nvidia jetson which comes out of the box with Ubuntu pre-installed (it's slightly more complicated but that's the gist). You can run other OSes but it is a messy experience and you can easily run into problems.
Yes, it is shitty from nvidia that they do it this way. But it is also convenient.
Unfortunately, they did in recent history manage to still break iptables, zfs, nilfs and a bunch of machines with weird (arguably broken) firmware anyway, so my personal comparison between Debian (or simply directly the Kroah-Hartman/Levin stable upstream) and the Ubuntu backports is not exactly in favor of Ubuntu.
But 15-20 years ago it was easier to install the nonfree stuff on ubuntu, like drivers and DVD playback and stuff. I don’t know if its still like that.
I never understood ubuntu as a server over debian, but for a desktop it was a nicer experience for a while.
I used to like Ubuntu and Canonical products and these days I’m more indifferent towards them. Their products have a place, but I wish Canonical would stop killing off some of the more interesting side projects.
I don’t use Ubuntu but use Fedora (and its derivatives) partially for that reason.
I really don’t care what I run on, as long as it’s some flavour of Linux, it works reliably, and it’s secure.
2. The LTS releases are supported by Canonical for at least five years on the free tier, and up to fifteen years with paid support contracts.
It's still a pretty basic reason businesses might calculate that Ubuntu is a good fit.
When I interviewed with them a couple of years ago, I got the sense there was a lot broken with their culture. It was the best choice back when RedHat/CentOS stopped providing long term security updates, but now that Rocky Linux is around, it’s getting to be time to jump ship again.
Debian[1]:
> trixie (stable) (editors): heavily refactored vim fork > 0.10.4-8: amd64 arm64 armel armhf i386 ppc64el riscv64 s390x > forky (testing) (editors): heavily refactored vim fork > 0.12.4-1: amd64 arm64 armhf i386 loong64 ppc64el riscv64 s390x
Ubuntu[2]:
> stonking (26.10) (editors): heavily refactored vim fork [universe] > 0.12.4-1: amd64 arm64 armhf ppc64el riscv64 s390x
I use Debian stable myself and build neovim from source for this specific reason.
[1]: https://packages.debian.org/search?keywords=neovim
[2]: https://packages.ubuntu.com/search?keywords=neovim&searchon=...
I had to go through the torturous path of Ubuntu -> Mint -> Mint Debian -> Debian. The last step was after I used a Debian live disk to do something and I could see that the stories were nonsense; just something that had adhered to the word Debian in my mind through repetition.
The two worst parts about it were 1) that I had long left Ubuntu on servers and had been using Debian there for years - I was just afraid of the desktop for some reason, and 2) that if I had just listened 15-20 years ago when people told me that FrankenDebians were nothing but problems, I would have never been caught in the net.
I've never been a fan of Ubuntu's business practices, but I'm just generally not into Debian derivatives anymore. If I were to leave Debian, it would be for an entirely different (and philosophically different) distro. I probably make an exception for Devuan, because it's only trying to change one thing (that I think of as the biggest threat to Linux, the final boss evil spawn of RedHat.) Devuan is an escape hatch for when the rugpull happens.
I use desktop Ubuntu because it's up to date and it just works for me, and I can play the latest games in it with Steam + Proton. I don't have to tweak it or do any additional downloading of stuff besides the Nvidia drivers (I actually don't remember how I installed them).
Can I do this with Debian, in a no fuss way? (I know this can be done in any distro, that's why I'm stressing "no fuss").
But this is the thing I appreciate about Ubuntu. I know my LTS is from 26.04. I know all my software (with specific exceptions) is backported from that. The previous LTS were 24.04, 22.04, etc. With Debian, I won't know these out of my head. Partly cause I am into Ubuntu, but also because it isn't opaque. I mean, I don't remember from which time Potato and Woody were (but I used to run both back in the days). With Ubuntu, I remember (the codenames of Ubuntu I forgot).
Rest of games, Steam handles. I'm hooked on their ecosystem, kind if for a similar reason as Ubuntu (loyally sticked to them). As European I'd prefer a European gaming distribution platform, but Steam is just good and a fair netizen. Linux-friendly, too. I own a Steam Deck, too. Only reason I'd want non-Steam is all these free games I got on GOG/Epic/Amazon, and maybe some good ol' emulation.
On Arch I just installed the flatpak and didn't think about it, everything works.
1. Hardware generally just works
2. Videos that use patented formats just play without fiddling
3. Proprietary closed-source software, if they even support Linux, usually releases Ubuntu binaries before anything else
Are those fatal flaws? No. But lots of people just don't want to deal with it. And there's a market for that.
Ubuntu kernels are not the one that Debian uses. The latest stable Debian is based on a 2 years old Kernel ( 6.12 ).
I agree btw. But I've been using Linux since end of 90s (I barely made use of the 2.0 Linux kernel series). I quickly established on Debian in the Potato/Woody era. Debian, back then, was severely slow with new releases. So I ended up with Testing. Which got slower security updates than Unstable. Which sometimes broke (like any rolling release does). Back then Ubuntu got released (we talking '04 and '06). And I just sticked with Ubuntu. On servers, too. I endured it all, including the Amazon spyware, the ads in MOTD, and the switch to an inferior in-house software management for some package (which name we won't mention).
> What is Ubuntu offering that Debian doesn't provide?
I have it right now at zero additional effort
And I am not letting LLM to send contents of my private files to LLM providers.
It just has package for nvidia drivers. Not sure if installer will install it automatically for you (I kinda... use my install for last 12 years, just upgrading it).
For me both with AMD and NVIDIA whole hardware driver story was "install it, it works"
At least Debian is on Wayland. Mint is on X11, which was causing black screen out of the box on my fairly typical PC.
The post gives no details about what this vulnerability is, how critical it is, how it is impacting them personally, how vulnerable their servers are, how they are working around it.
Just a title designed to generate the maximum outrage followed by a few meaningless lines.
Yes it does? And Ubuntu is selling security subscriptions and doing a poor job of it, These aren't open source volunteers, this is a paid product.
what? the literal first paragraph says:
"In case you missed it: CVE-2026-98432 is a critical (CVSS 9.8) bug in the Linux kernel's TCP code. It's been there since 2016, so virtually every Linux server on the planet has it, and it can be hit remotely"
Maybe it's time for StealMyBitcoinV2…
Also this vulnerability is not strictly about mptcp, although the exploitability is not clear.
We keep doing this to ourselves. Heads should roll at Ubuntu. Start that process right now? You can't. You see, nobody is directly available to sue. It does seem that nobody ever truly cared about that. The insecure codebase and tech debt shall continue to grow because that is the gift.
https://apenwarr.ca/log/20211229-the-gift-of-its-your-proble...
Much like with PHP2Shell, it doesn't need to be utterly trivially exploitable to be a big concern.
https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2026-98432
It’s still, over a week after disclosure and patches, unpatched in Ubuntu.
As for me, a part of me wants to move over to Rocky Linux 10.
Does Rocky use their own community-built packages, or does it use RHEL's?
Because I don't think Red Hat have released patches yet either?
https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/cve-2026-98432
For RedHat/Rocky 10:
https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2026:93413
Also, a mitigation:
https://access.redhat.com/security/vulnerabilities/RHSB-2026...
* https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux
You can pull them down with a "-t" added to your apt-get (but will not appear by default).
26LTS had the new kernel go to the updates/security repos on October 28.
I am not contributing to Ubuntu in any way, and that puts it into perspective.
(I still directly contribute to OSS and release OSS projects, but absolutely refuse to engage with the least bit of hostility. Any of that is an insta-block.)
But, imagine if the complaint vs paid ratio were more equal.
Right now, the ratio is massively skewed towards complainers vs paid. (>99.9% I'd guess)
(Taken from https://aws.amazon.com/security/security-bulletins/2026-160-...)
You can also use the following Suricata rule if your network firewall supports it:
`drop ip any any -> any any (msg:"CVE-2026-98432: drop IPv4 packets carrying IP options (IHL > 5)"; ipv4.hdr; bsize:>20; classtype:bad-unknown; sid:1000001; rev:2;)`
(I think CVSS is a very poor metric in cases like these; I'm just explaining what I think Ubuntu's process/position is, not making excuses for them. My read is the 9.8 is probably too high but nevertheless more accurate in this case.)
I use arch linux for my NAS because it's fun and I don't care if it occasionally goes down but I wouldn't use it for production (on my NAS it's mostly stable but has gone down a few times)
So what's next? Centos is a rolling upgrade, nixos?
VPS/VM? Debian is a great choice. Use it as base and run your software via systemd+podman if you want the most up to date stuff, Debian tends do lag a bit. It is very low maintenance.
Bare metal? Fedora Atomic is awesome. It does require an update every other week since it keeps packages closer to upstreams, but this is where the immutable base shines, any issue is an easy reboot to revert. Also systemd+podman for your own software.
I wouldn't recommend Arch on servers.
Edit: clarified Fedora immutable spins are called Fedora Atomic.
So just as they made it popular, they can make it unpopular. People like me will simply post on our blogs and social media that they should not install Ubuntu. A typical Ubuntu user is not that high on the tech scale, and they listen to people like me for suggestions on which distro.
Cut the pipeline that feeds into it.
AI is now capable of, and being applied to, find so many bugs recently that infrastructure providers need to up their game and respond quickly.
Hopefully this is a passing phase as bugs are quickly patched, and we'll get past it without too many incidents.
For me, I view Ubuntu as the "higher quality, more mature distro" which I value over "purity".
Of course, if one hides a bug long enough it will eventually disappear or become irrelevant.
Yes, indeed, WTF Ubuntu?
We are in that period between when software was good enough and when software is certified as secure by the writers.
The days of importing frameworks and libraries written by strangers is over. I would say the entire industry is not prepared at this moment for the unpatchable event where the only solution is to power off or disconnect.
cat /etc/apt/preferences.d/nosnap.pref
Package: snapd Pin: release a=* Pin-Priority: -10
Listened to over a decade of people chirping about the new hotness and calling my Debian servers lame, old and busted. Well look at you now!
I am a bit surprised by the panic...
See https://repology.org/repositories/graphs
If you pick a specific random package update, nixpkgs often has that update months to years before other distros.
If you pick a specific CVE, nixpkgs usually is better with the exception of embargoed ones, where Ubuntu, Fedora, etc get to prepare their patched packages ahead of time.
NixOS also makes it much easier than ubuntu to install your own patches and version of the linux kernel.
For example, assuming NixOS had not yet released the fixed linux version, 6.18.56 (though it has), you could upgrade to it before NixOS did it upstream with this one line:
boot.kernelPackages = pkgs.linuxPackagesFor (pkgs.linux_6_18.override {argsOverride = {src = pkgs.fetchurl {url = "mirror://kernel/linux/kernel/v6.x/linux-6.18.56.tar.xz"; }; version = "6.18.56"; modDirVersion = "6.18.56";};});
boot.kernelPatches = [{ patch = ./cve-patch.patch; }];
The debian and redhat based distros all make it so configuring what packages are installed ('apt install' / 'yum install') is a different operation from configuring the packages themselves.
On NixOS, the specification of how to build a package, what package is installed, patches, etc are all in the same language, and so it's a lot more natural to patch things as needed.
And also, LLMs are pretty good at generating working nix, so you can have an agent apply patches to your kernel package with NixOS quite easily. Agents can also do this for ubuntu or redhat, but in my experience they're much worse at it, and it's harder to undo mistakes if they mess up.
Either this was used to pop something big, or this is a jia tan situation going down.
I thought there was a flamebait automation that was prevent this sort of velocity (unless overridden)
I believe you can contribute to Ubuntu's source code right? Why don't you fix the issue then?
The beauty of OSS is that you don't need permission from anyone to modify the code to your own needs.
Canonical absolutely is marketing enterprise security updates (at least for those who pay). I don't see this in the paid ESM updates channel yet either?
> Oh and btw, distros run by volunteers (Debian, Arch, Alpine...) hve shipped the fix. Meanwhile Ubuntu, made by a company that sells security subscriptions, hasn't. This is true as of 2026-11-02 14:48 UTC.
(Also, ubuntu already has the fix. What they're dragging their feet on is releasing the updated version. I don't think anyone outside ubuntu can help with that process)
Let's see you do it.
Just not picked up by this distribution which advertises itself as having “Enterprise-grade support and integration”. https://ubuntu.com/desktop#:~:text=Enterprise%2Dgrade%20supp...
If they don’t have the resources to handle this, they should be recruiting more help from their community
But it doesn't sound too hard to backport a patch from Debian to Ubuntu yourself.
So if it's a critical security concern to your company, open your laptop and get to work.
And Slackware too:
Thu Oct 22 23:04:17 UTC 2026
patches/packages/linux-5.15.223/kernel-generic-5.15.223-x86_64-1.txz: Upgraded.
patches/packages/linux-5.15.223/kernel-headers-5.15.223-x86-1.txz: Upgraded.
patches/packages/linux-5.15.223/kernel-huge-5.15.223-x86_64-1.txz: Upgraded.
patches/packages/linux-5.15.223/kernel-modules-5.15.223-x86_64-1.txz: Upgraded.
patches/packages/linux-5.15.223/kernel-source-5.15.223-noarch-1.txz: Upgraded.
This update fixes bugs and security issues, including the PwnEscape flaw.
For more information, see:
https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-99999
(* Security fix *)
I stopped using it back in 2004 when Patrick had health problems. It seems to be a passion project and it stopped getting updates while he recovered. There is a community behind it but it may mainly be driven forward by him.
It looks like it's fairly slow to get updates, generally, as the last release was Slackware 15 in 2022. Maybe that reflects it's dictator (his word not mine) or maybe it reflects it's stability.
Yet, despite all that, Slackware got this security fix around 10 days ago.
IIRC it had minimal HN discussion.
Well - Ubuntu sold out to marketing rather than engineering.
Happened to Google too. Compare Google Search to 10 or 15 years ago. Totally useless nowadays.
No offense but Anthropic says that every time.
Not to mention however many production services teams I work with build and maintain that run on Ubuntu.
Ubuntu are dragging their feet and it’s not good enough. Nowhere near good enough.
Get it patched NOW!
And if you’re on here and you work for Ubuntu, then what the hell are you doing reading this when you should be shipping a patch?
Seriously: get on it, will you?
There's been lots of drama on Ubuntu which OP either completely missed or ignored. Ubuntu has been getting worse for over a decade now.
On another note, you can probably easily install the Debian kernel onto your machine.
"But we need signed kernels!" Well, that's a big "I told you so" from the people that were against only a handful of distros being able to create signed kernels with MS derived keys like 15 years ago.
What an awful system
I haven’t used Ubuntu for a few years now but I’m glad they’re getting this trial by fire now. This new era of software vulnerabilities is going to reduce the viability of a lot of smaller distros who more or less are entirely dependent on upstream for security and reliability. I sincerely wish the Ubuntu folks well but this is a sink or swim moment, and even if they sink it will be a net positive for Linux as a whole as weaker projects get picked off like the slowest antelope in the herd.
"If you're not paying, you're the product-" hey jerks, the analogy doesn't always work
dismal
i wouldn't even want your jobs because if this is tolerated then it's extremely unsavory anyways
Let's be clear the security vulns will never end and if you're running anything connected to the network eventually you'll get pwned.