HIGH
mm PCP Corruption
CVE-2026-23025
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
KernelScan AI6.1MEDIUM
01Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: mm/page_alloc: prevent pcp corruption with SMP=n The kernel test robot has reported: BUG: spinlock trylock failure on UP on CPU#0, kcompactd0/28 lock: 0xffff888807e35ef0, .magic: dead4ead, .owner: kcompactd0/28, .owner_cpu: 0 CPU: 0 UID: 0 PID: 28 Comm: kcompactd0 Not tainted 6.18.0-rc5-00127-ga06157804399 #1 PREEMPT 8cc09ef94dcec767faa911515ce9e609c45db470 Call Trace: <IRQ> __dump_stack (lib/dump_stack.c:95) dump_stack_lvl (lib/dump_stack.c:123) dump_stack (lib/dump_stack.c:130) spin_dump (kernel/locking/spinlock_debug.c:71) do_raw_spin_trylock (kernel/locking/spinlock_debug.c:?) _raw_spin_trylock (include/linux/spinlock_api_smp.h:89 kernel/locking/spinlock.c:138) __free_frozen_pages (mm/page_alloc.c:2973) ___free_pages (mm/page_alloc.c:5295) __free_pages (mm/page_alloc.c:5334) tlb_remove_table_rcu (include/linux/mm.h:? include/linux/mm.h:3122 include/asm-generic/tlb.h:220 mm/mmu_gather.c:227 mm/mmu_gather.c:290) ? __cfi_tlb_remove_table_rcu (mm/mmu_gather.c:289) ? rcu_core (kernel/rcu/tree.c:?) rcu_core (include/linux/rcupdate.h:341 kernel/rcu/tree.c:2607 kernel/rcu/tree.c:2861) rcu_core_si (kernel/rcu/tree.c:2879) handle_softirqs (arch/x86/include/asm/jump_label.h:36 include/trace/events/irq.h:142 kernel/softirq.c:623) __irq_exit_rcu (arch/x86/include/asm/jump_label.h:36 kernel/softirq.c:725) irq_exit_rcu (kernel/softirq.c:741) sysvec_apic_timer_interrupt (arch/x86/kernel/apic/apic.c:1052) </IRQ> <TASK> RIP: 0010:_raw_spin_unlock_irqrestore (arch/x86/include/asm/preempt.h:95 include/linux/spinlock_api_smp.h:152 kernel/locking/spinlock.c:194) free_pcppages_bulk (mm/page_alloc.c:1494) drain_pages_zone (include/linux/spinlock.h:391 mm/page_alloc.c:2632) __drain_all_pages (mm/page_alloc.c:2731) drain_all_pages (mm/page_alloc.c:2747) kcompactd (mm/compaction.c:3115) kthread (kernel/kthread.c:465) ? __cfi_kcompactd (mm/compaction.c:3166) ? __cfi_kthread (kernel/kthread.c:412) ret_from_fork (arch/x86/kernel/process.c:164) ? __cfi_kthread (kernel/kthread.c:412) ret_from_fork_asm (arch/x86/entry/entry_64.S:255) </TASK> Matthew has analyzed the report and identified that in drain_page_zone() we are in a section protected by spin_lock(&pcp->lock) and then get an interrupt that attempts spin_trylock() on the same lock. The code is designed to work this way without disabling IRQs and occasionally fail the trylock with a fallback. However, the SMP=n spinlock implementation assumes spin_trylock() will always succeed, and thus it's normally a no-op. Here the enabled lock debugging catches the problem, but otherwise it could cause a corruption of the pcp structure. The problem has been introduced by commit 574907741599 ("mm/page_alloc: leave IRQs enabled for per-cpu page allocations"). The pcp locking scheme recognizes the need for disabling IRQs to prevent nesting spin_trylock() sections on SMP=n, but the need to prevent the nesting in spin_lock() has not been recognized. Fix it by introducing local wrappers that change the spin_lock() to spin_lock_iqsave() with SMP=n and use them in all places that do spin_lock(&pcp->lock). [vbabka@suse.cz: add pcp_ prefix to the spin_lock_irqsave wrappers, per Steven]
02KernelScan AI Analysis
Risk summary
Local users with low privileges can trigger kernel corruption in the per-CPU page allocator on single-processor, non-PREEMPT_RT systems. This leads to corruption of kernel page allocator metadata and system crashes, affecting system stability and service continuity.
Vulnerability analysis
The vulnerability stems from improper locking in the per-CPU page (PCP) allocator when CONFIG_SMP=n and CONFIG_PREEMPT_RT=n. The code uses spin_lock() to protect PCP structures but leaves interrupts enabled, creating a scenario where an interrupt handler can attempt spin_trylock() on the same lock. On UP systems without PREEMPT_RT, spinlocks are no-ops and spin_trylock() always succeeds, leading to nested critical sections that corrupt the PCP structure. The fix introduces conditional IRQ-disabling wrappers that use spin_lock_irqsave() on affected systems while preserving the original behavior on SMP or PREEMPT_RT systems.
03Fix Versions
| Branch | Fixed in | Patch commit |
|---|---|---|
| 6.1 | 6.1.162 | 68688fc4eab0 |
| 6.12 | 6.12.67 | df63d31e9ae0 |
| 6.18 | 6.18.7 | 3098f8f7c7b0 |
| 6.6 | 6.6.122 | 4a04ff9cd816 |
| mainline | 6.19 | 038a102535eb |