CVE Catalog

CVE-2026-98464

CriticalCVSS 9.3
Published: Updated: Translated: NVD NIST

Exploitation Probability (EPSS)

Low risk
0.17%

6th percentile - higher than 6% of all known CVEs

Summary

In the Linux kernel, a race condition exists in the RISC-V KVM component during VM teardown. The non-Sstc hrtimer callback clears next_set before its final uses of the vCPU, and if teardown observes next_set as false while the callback is still running, kvm_riscv_vcpu_timer_cancel() skips hrtimer_cancel() and the vCPU can be freed before the callback completes. This results in a use-after-free detected by KASAN.

Risk Assessment

The vulnerability can cause kernel memory corruption (use-after-free) and potentially crash or compromise the host system. Exploitation requires a malicious guest and a VMM that honors KVM_EXIT_SYSTEM_EVENT and destroys the VM, and reproduction is timing-sensitive.

Recommendation

Update the Linux kernel to a version containing the fix that always invokes hrtimer_cancel() for an initialized timer before vCPU destruction. Until patched, restrict the ability to run untrusted virtual machines on affected hosts.

Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel

See all
Original NVD description (English source)

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: RISC-V: KVM: Synchronize hrtimer callback during teardown The non-Sstc hrtimer callback clears next_set before its final uses of the enclosing vCPU. If teardown observes next_set as false while the callback is still running, kvm_riscv_vcpu_timer_cancel() skips hrtimer_cancel() and kvm_destroy_vcpus() can free the vCPU before the callback enters kvm_riscv_vcpu_set_interrupt(). A guest can arm the timer with SBI TIME and request shutdown with SBI legacy shutdown or SRST. A VMM that honors KVM_EXIT_SYSTEM_EVENT and destroys the VM supplies the teardown side of the race; no post-launch host ioctl is needed to arm or request teardown. On upstream master 62cc90241548, generic KASAN reported: BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in do_raw_spin_lock Write of size 4 at addr ff60000005e58898 kvm_riscv_vcpu_set_interrupt kvm_riscv_vcpu_hrtimer_expired __hrtimer_run_queues hrtimer_interrupt The object was allocated by KVM_CREATE_VCPU and freed concurrently by: kvm_destroy_vcpus kvm_arch_destroy_vm kvm_destroy_vm __fput For deterministic validation, I added mdelay(1000) immediately after the existing next_set = false assignment. This only widens the existing post-clear callback window. A no-delay trace build naturally reached the callback-after-teardown-start/before-deinit ordering in 12 of 200 runs, but 1,500 stock-kernel stress iterations did not produce a KASAN report, so natural reproduction is timing-sensitive. Always invoke hrtimer_cancel() for an initialized timer. Preserve the existing -EINVAL result when the timer is no longer set, but only after synchronizing with a running callback. With this patch, hrtimer_cancel() blocked for the full widened callback window before vCPU destruction. KASAN reported no error in 100 fixed-and-widened runs or 200 fix-only timing-sweep runs.

Vulnerability data from NVD (NIST) · CISA KEV · EPSS