⚠ Reference material — not professional advice. Test in staging, back up first, verify against your specific version. Use your own judgment for your environment.
● High · CVSS 8.7

How to Fix CVE-2026-8696: Use-After-Free in radare2

Other vulnerabilities in the same area that are worth patching alongside this one:

*By Sai Kiran Pandrala*

⚡ At a glance
SeverityCVSS 8.7 - High
Actively exploited?Not currently listed in CISA KEV
Affected6.1.5
Fixed inc213ad6894a1eb9086ac8bf5fae35757e9e1683c
Type (CWE)CWE-416: Use After Free

What is CVE-2026-8696?

CVE-2026-8696 is an use-after-free bug in radare2. A reference to freed memory is dereferenced later in the program, allowing an attacker who controls the reallocated content to hijack execution. Vendor description: radare2 6.1.5 contains a use-after-free vulnerability in the gdbr_pids_list() function within the GDB client core that allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service or potentially execute arbitrary code by sending malformed thread information responses. Attackers can trigger the vulnerability by causing qsThreadInfo to fail after qfThreadInfo successfully allocates RDebugPid structures, resulting in double-free memory corruption when the error path attempts to clean up the list.

Why this CVE matters

Use-after-free vulnerabilities in a network or media-parsing path tend to draw immediate exploit development effort. The bug class is well understood, and public toolkits exist that adapt quickly to newly disclosed cases.

For deployments of radare2 that have been exposed to the public internet during the disclosure window, the operating assumption should be that scanning has already happened. Even where exploitation has not been publicly observed, scanning for the vulnerable fingerprint is cheap and routine. Patching closes the door; log review and credential rotation close out the rest of the response.

Am I affected?

You are affected if your installation matches any of these version ranges:

Check your installed version against the list above. If you cannot determine the version, treat the system as affected and follow the upgrade path below.

Open radare2's About dialog or run the vendor-documented version-check command. Compare the result against the affected ranges in the advisory.

How to fix CVE-2026-8696

  1. Read the vendor advisory in full: https://github.com/radareorg/radare2/issues/25836
  2. Upgrade radare2 to c213ad6894a1eb9086ac8bf5fae35757e9e1683c or a later version listed in the vendor advisory.
  3. Back up the configuration (and database, where applicable) before upgrading.
  4. Apply the patch in a maintenance window. For HA pairs, upgrade the standby node first, fail over, then upgrade the former primary.
  5. Restart the affected service so the patched binary loads, then verify the new version (see verification section).

Open-source library upgrade

The vendor advisory (https://github.com/radareorg/radare2/commit/c213ad6894a1eb9086ac8bf5fae35757e9e1683c) names the patched release as radare2 c213ad6894a1eb9086ac8bf5fae35757e9e1683c. Pull the

fixed version through whichever ecosystem actually ships radare2.


# Vendor advisory: https://github.com/radareorg/radare2/issues/25836
# npm / pnpm / yarn
npm install radare2@latest
npm ls radare2

# Or pin to the patched version named in the advisory
npm install radare2@<patched-version>

# pip / Poetry
pip install --upgrade "radare2"
pip show radare2 | grep -i version
poetry add "radare2@^<patched-version>"

# Go modules
go get example.com/radare2@<patched-version>
go mod tidy

# Rust crates
cargo update -p radare2

# Composer
composer require vendor/radare2:^<patched-version>


# Vendor advisory: https://github.com/radareorg/radare2/issues/25836
# Container image: rebuild against the patched base and roll the deployment.
docker pull <your-registry>/radare2:<patched-tag>
docker stop <app> && docker rm <app>
docker run -d --name <app> <your-registry>/radare2:<patched-tag>

# Kubernetes
kubectl set image deployment/<deployment-name> <container>=<your-registry>/radare2:<patched-tag>
kubectl rollout status deployment/<deployment-name>

Linux package upgrade

The vendor advisory (https://github.com/radareorg/radare2/commit/c213ad6894a1eb9086ac8bf5fae35757e9e1683c) names the patched build as radare2 c213ad6894a1eb9086ac8bf5fae35757e9e1683c.


# Ubuntu / Debian
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install --only-upgrade radare2
dpkg -s radare2 | grep -i version

# RHEL / Rocky / AlmaLinux / Fedora
sudo dnf upgrade --refresh radare2 -y
rpm -q radare2

# openSUSE
sudo zypper refresh && sudo zypper update radare2

# Restart the service that loads the patched binary
sudo systemctl restart radare2 2>/dev/null || true
sudo systemctl status radare2 --no-pager 2>/dev/null || true


# Vendor advisory: https://github.com/radareorg/radare2/issues/25836
# Container deployments: rebuild with the patched package layer, then roll the workload.
docker pull <your-registry>/radare2:<patched-tag>
docker stop <app> && docker rm <app>
docker run -d --name <app> <your-registry>/radare2:<patched-tag>

# Kubernetes
kubectl set image deployment/<deployment-name> radare2=<your-registry>/radare2:<patched-tag>
kubectl rollout status deployment/<deployment-name>

Verify the fix landed


# Vendor advisory: https://github.com/radareorg/radare2/issues/25836
# 1. Compare the running version against the fixed build named above.
#    (Replace the version probe with the platform-specific command from the block above.)

# 2. Re-scan with your vulnerability scanner (Nessus, Qualys, Tenable, OpenVAS).
#    The scanner should no longer flag this CVE on the patched target.

# 3. Inspect recent service / kernel logs for crash loops or rollback events.
journalctl -u <service> --since "10 minutes ago"
dmesg --since "10 minutes ago"

If you cannot patch immediately

Block network reachability to the vulnerable service from untrusted networks and apply the patched build. Memory-corruption bugs cannot be reliably mitigated at the network layer; the patch is the fix.

How to verify the fix worked

If your installation was internet-reachable during the disclosure window, treat log review as part of the remediation rather than an optional follow-up. Look for repeated service restarts, crash logs from the affected daemon, and core files generated around the time of any anomalous traffic. A memory-corruption flaw used for exploitation often leaves a trail of failed attempts before the successful one.

Frequently asked questions

Is CVE-2026-8696 being exploited in the wild?

Public exploitation has not been confirmed by CISA at the time of writing. Treat the patch as time-sensitive anyway; reports often lag actual abuse.

Will a WAF or IDS rule fully mitigate CVE-2026-8696?

No. Network-layer filters can reduce noise and slow opportunistic scanners, but they will not stop a determined attacker. The vendor patch is the only durable fix.

How long should I plan for the upgrade?

Typical vendor-documented upgrade windows for radare2 run from a few minutes to under an hour depending on cluster size. Test in a staging environment first and follow the vendor's documented HA upgrade order.

References

*This guide was assembled from the official vendor advisory, the NVD record, and the CISA KEV catalog entry on 2026-05-25. Always confirm against the vendor advisory before applying changes in production.*