Executive brief
A vulnerability in the Linux kernel's Intel graphics driver can cause a system crash (kernel panic) when certain display hardware is initialized. This occurs due to an error in how the system calculates display timings for specific screen modes. An exploit would result in a complete loss of system availability, potentially disrupting operations or causing data loss from unsaved work.
Technical details
A divide-by-zero vulnerability exists in the Linux kernel's i915 DRM driver within the `icl_dsi.c` component. The root cause is improper horizontal timing adjustments for Display Stream Compression (DSC) when the device is in 'command mode' rather than 'video mode'. These adjustments can result in a calculated `htotal` value so small that `line_time_us` becomes zero, leading to a division by zero when determining `vtotal`. A local attacker or a specific hardware configuration can trigger this during driver initialization, resulting in a kernel panic (DoS). The fix involves restricting DSC horizontal timing adjustments to video mode only, as specified in hardware documentation.
Affected products
- Linux Linux Kernel 5.6 to 6.12.81, 6.13 to 6.18.22, 6.19 to 6.19.12, 7.0-rc1 to 7.0-rc6
Timeline
- 2026-05-01: disclosed
- 2026-05-01: advisory
- 2026-04-11: patched: Patched in stable branches via multiple commits.