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CVE-2026-64561 High

KVM: x86: Check for invalid/obsolete root *after* making MMU pages available

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: KVM: x86: Check for invalid/obsolete root *after* making MMU pages available Check for a "stale" page fault, i.e. for an invalid and/or obsolete root, after making MMU pages available for the shadow MMU. If reclaiming shadow pages zaps an in-use root, i.e. marks it invalid, then KVM will attempt to map memory into an invalid root. On its own, populating an invalid root is "fine", but because child shadow pages inherit their parent's role, any children created during the map/fetch will be created as invalid pages, thus violating KVM's invariant that invalid pages are never on the list of active MMU pages. Note, the underlying flaw has existed since KVM first started tracking invalid roots in 2008 (commit 2e53d63acba7, "KVM: MMU: ignore zapped root pagetables"), but the true badness only came along in 2020 (Linux 5.9) with the invariant that invalid shadow pages can't be on the list of active pages. Note #2, inheriting role.invalid when creating child shadow pages is also far from ideal; that flaw will be addressed separately.

Exploit probability 0.1%
Published August 4, 2026
Required by Not available
Last source change August 20, 2026

02 / AFFECTED SOFTWARE

Affected packages

Linux Kernel
Unknown Unknown

03 / CONNECTIONS

Connected vulnerabilities

04 / EVIDENCE

Source records

Open Source Vulnerabilities CVE-2026-64561

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: KVM: x86: Check for invalid/obsolete root *after* making MMU pages available Check for a "stale" page fault, i.e. for an invalid and/or obsolete root, after making MMU pages available for the shadow MMU. If reclaiming shadow pages zaps an in-use root, i.e. marks it invalid, then KVM will attempt to map memory into an invalid root. On its own, populating an invalid root is "fine", but because child shadow pages inherit their parent's role, any children created during the map/fetch will be created as invalid pages, thus violating KVM's invariant that invalid pages are never on the list of active MMU pages. Note, the underlying flaw has existed since KVM first started tracking invalid roots in 2008 (commit 2e53d63acba7, "KVM: MMU: ignore zapped root pagetables"), but the true badness only came along in 2020 (Linux 5.9) with the invariant that invalid shadow pages can't be on the list of active pages. Note #2, inheriting role.invalid when creating child shadow pages is also far from ideal; that flaw will be addressed separately.

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05 / REFERENCES

Further evidence