Linux TCP use-after-free (CVE-2026-98432): Anthropic’s exploit, vendor status, and what admins should do
A serious race-condition bug in the Linux kernel’s IPv4 TCP path, tracked as CVE-2026-98432, has drawn attention because the kernel team rated it 9.8/10 on the CVSS scale and because Anthropic says its AI model wrote an exploit that achieved root command execution against servers running a multipath TCP (MPTCP) listener. Vendors and distributions have diverging severity scores and staggered patch timelines, leaving many administrators deciding whether to wait for…