CVE-2026-74568: KVM: arm64: vgic: Fix race between LPI release and re-registration

Greg Kroah-Hartman <[email protected]>
Newsgroups org.kernel.vger.linux-cve-announce
Message-ID <2026081554-CVE-2026-74568-beb4@gregkh>
From: Greg Kroah-Hartman <[email protected]>

Description
===========

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

KVM: arm64: vgic: Fix race between LPI release and re-registration

Fix a potential race between decrementing an LPI's reference count and
evicting that structure from the LPI xarray.

LPI structures are maintained in the VGIC LPI xarray (dist->lpi_xa).
When the reference count of an LPI structure drops to zero,
vgic_release_lpi_locked() removes the structure from the xarray and
frees it under the xarray lock.

However, the release of an LPI can race with a concurrent LPI
re-registration with the same INTID via vgic_add_lpi() on another CPU,
since the reference count drop and the xarray eviction are not performed
in a single atomic step. This can happen e.g. if the guest issues a
DISCARD while the LPI is still referenced from a vCPU's active-pending
list (ap_list), and the same INTID is re-mapped via MAPTI.

Particularly, vgic_release_lpi_locked() is called from two distinct
paths: direct release via vgic_put_irq(), and deferred release via
vgic_release_deleted_lpis(). During direct release, the issue can result
in deleting a newly registered LPI from the xarray:

  CPU0 (Releasing LPI)                    CPU1 (Adding new LPI)
  ====================                    =====================
  vgic_put_irq()
      __vgic_put_irq()
          refcount_dec_and_test()
                                          vgic_add_lpi()
                                              xa_lock_irqsave()
                                              old_irq = xa_load(.., intid)
                                              vgic_try_get_irq_ref(old_irq) == false
                        new IRQ inserted -->  __xa_store(.., intid, ..)
                                              xa_unlock_irqrestore()
  xa_lock_irqsave();
  vgic_release_lpi_locked()
      __xa_erase(.., irq->intid)   <-- BUG: new IRQ is erased
      kfree_rcu(old_irq)

During the deferred release path, the old IRQ can be leaked:

  CPU0 (Releasing LPI)                    CPU1 (Adding new LPI)
  ====================                    =====================
  vgic_put_irq_norelease()
      __vgic_put_irq()
          refcount_dec_and_test()
      irq->pending_release = true
                                          vgic_add_lpi()
                                              xa_lock_irqsave()
                                              old_irq = xa_load(.., intid)
                                              vgic_try_get_irq_ref(oldirq) == false
                 BUG: old IRQ overwritten --> __xa_store(.., intid, ..)
                                              xa_unlock_irqrestore()

  vgic_release_deleted_lpis()
      xa_lock_irqsave()
      xa_for_each() { .. } <-- old IRQ with pending_release = true
                               is gone, so it cannot be released

To fix the direct release path, move the reference count drop inside
the xarray lock, making sure that vgic_add_lpi() never encounters the
to-be-released LPI.

In the deferred release path, the refcount drop must happen under a raw
spinlock, so the xarray lock cannot be grabbed, and the same solution
does not work. Instead, update vgic_add_lpi(), so that if it evicts
an LPI from the xarray, it takes on the responsibility of freeing it.
Consequently, an LPI may now be freed concurrently after a deferred
release drops the refcount, so accessing the pending_release field is no
longer safe from use-after-free. Delete all uses of the flag, and update
vgic_release_deleted_lpis() to identify orphaned LPIs purely based on
their refcount.

The Linux kernel CVE team has assigned CVE-2026-74568 to this issue.


Affected and fixed versions
===========================

	Issue introduced in 6.17 with commit 3a08a6ca7c373198c84e2a8c025c395ee966ff8a and fixed in 7.1.8 with commit 292e80a159aa88635bf668a7212cfdf526b8bd52
	Issue introduced in 6.17 with commit 3a08a6ca7c373198c84e2a8c025c395ee966ff8a and fixed in 7.2-rc6 with commit cbfe2b24a1ea9de35032dbdd100fdc700f5be92d

Please see https://www.kernel.org for a full list of currently supported
kernel versions by the kernel community.

Unaffected versions might change over time as fixes are backported to
older supported kernel versions.  The official CVE entry at
	https://cve.org/CVERecord/?id=CVE-2026-74568
will be updated if fixes are backported, please check that for the most
up to date information about this issue.


Affected files
==============

The file(s) affected by this issue are:
	arch/arm64/kvm/vgic/vgic-its.c
	arch/arm64/kvm/vgic/vgic.c
	include/kvm/arm_vgic.h


Mitigation
==========

The Linux kernel CVE team recommends that you update to the latest
stable kernel version for this, and many other bugfixes.  Individual
changes are never tested alone, but rather are part of a larger kernel
release.  Cherry-picking individual commits is not recommended or
supported by the Linux kernel community at all.  If however, updating to
the latest release is impossible, the individual changes to resolve this
issue can be found at these commits:
	https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/292e80a159aa88635bf668a7212cfdf526b8bd52
	https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/cbfe2b24a1ea9de35032dbdd100fdc700f5be92d
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