Using the attached program I can trigger the following WARNING reliably as a normal user. This happens at least both in 3.8-rc6 and 3.7.5. The kernel is tainted by proprietary NVIDIA module, but I don't thinks it matters in this case. [ 4390.882323] ------------[ cut here ]------------ [ 4390.882342] WARNING: at fs/inode.c:280 drop_nlink+0x41/0x50() [ 4390.882345] Hardware name: M50Vm [ 4390.882347] Modules linked in: fuse rfcomm bnep snd_hda_codec_hdmi nvidia(PO) snd_hda_codec_realtek snd_hda_intel iwldvm snd_hda_codec snd_hwdep uvcvideo btusb videobuf2_vmalloc videobuf2_memops videobuf2_core mac80211 bluetooth snd_seq snd_seq_device snd_pcm asus_laptop iwlwifi cfg80211 snd_page_alloc snd_timer videodev r8169 input_polldev sparse_keymap snd soundcore kvm_intel kvm microcode rfkill i2c_core mii pcspkr uinput hid_generic firewire_ohci sdhci_pci sdhci mmc_core firewire_core crc_itu_t [ 4390.882438] Pid: 6040, comm: rm Tainted: P W O 3.8.0-rc6 #1 [ 4390.882442] Call Trace: [ 4390.882453] [] warn_slowpath_common+0x7a/0xb0 [ 4390.882460] [] warn_slowpath_null+0x15/0x20 [ 4390.882466] [] drop_nlink+0x41/0x50 [ 4390.882478] [] fuse_unlink+0xdf/0x130 [fuse] [ 4390.882486] [] vfs_unlink+0x8d/0x100 [ 4390.882493] [] do_unlinkat+0x199/0x220 [ 4390.882501] [] ? call_rcu_sched+0x12/0x20 [ 4390.882508] [] ? __put_cred+0x3a/0x50 [ 4390.882516] [] ? sys_faccessat+0x137/0x1e0 [ 4390.882524] [] sys_unlinkat+0x16/0x40 [ 4390.882532] [] system_call_fastpath+0x1a/0x1f [ 4390.882536] ---[ end trace 372eef394febff4c ]---