KernelScan.io

HIGH

mm HugeZero Deref

CVE-2026-31397

CVSS 7.8 / 10.0 NVD

CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

KernelScan AI5.9MEDIUM

01

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: mm/huge_memory: fix use of NULL folio in move_pages_huge_pmd() move_pages_huge_pmd() handles UFFDIO_MOVE for both normal THPs and huge zero pages. For the huge zero page path, src_folio is explicitly set to NULL, and is used as a sentinel to skip folio operations like lock and rmap. In the huge zero page branch, src_folio is NULL, so folio_mk_pmd(NULL, pgprot) passes NULL through folio_pfn() and page_to_pfn(). With SPARSEMEM_VMEMMAP this silently produces a bogus PFN, installing a PMD pointing to non-existent physical memory. On other memory models it is a NULL dereference. Use page_folio(src_page) to obtain the valid huge zero folio from the page, which was obtained from pmd_page() and remains valid throughout. After commit d82d09e48219 ("mm/huge_memory: mark PMD mappings of the huge zero folio special"), moved huge zero PMDs must remain special so vm_normal_page_pmd() continues to treat them as special mappings. move_pages_huge_pmd() currently reconstructs the destination PMD in the huge zero page branch, which drops PMD state such as pmd_special() on architectures with CONFIG_ARCH_HAS_PTE_SPECIAL. As a result, vm_normal_page_pmd() can treat the moved huge zero PMD as a normal page and corrupt its refcount. Instead of reconstructing the PMD from the folio, derive the destination entry from src_pmdval after pmdp_huge_clear_flush(), then handle the PMD metadata the same way move_huge_pmd() does for moved entries by marking it soft-dirty and clearing uffd-wp.

02

Engine v0.2.0

Risk summary

Local users with low privileges can trigger a NULL pointer dereference or install a bogus page-table entry when using userfaultfd UFFDIO_MOVE operations on huge zero pages. On non-SPARSEMEM_VMEMMAP systems this causes a kernel oops/panic. On SPARSEMEM_VMEMMAP systems a bogus PMD pointing to non-existent physical memory is installed, leading to a crash upon access. Additionally, dropped PMD special-state causes vm_normal_page_pmd() to mis-handle the mapping and corrupt the page refcount, resulting in limited memory corruption.

Affectedmm/huge_memory.c (memory management)

Vulnerability analysis

The vulnerability occurs in move_pages_huge_pmd() when handling UFFDIO_MOVE for huge zero pages. The code incorrectly passes a NULL src_folio to folio_mk_pmd(), which invokes folio_pfn() and page_to_pfn() on NULL. On memory models without SPARSEMEM_VMEMMAP this dereferences NULL in kernel context and causes an oops/panic. On SPARSEMEM_VMEMMAP it silently computes a bogus PFN from the vmemmap base, installing an invalid PMD that faults on access. Separately, reconstructing the destination PMD from the folio drops the pmd_special() flag (where ARCH_HAS_PTE_SPECIAL is enabled), causing vm_normal_page_pmd() to treat the huge zero page as a normal page and corrupt its refcount. The fix derives the destination PMD from the original src_pmdval after clearing the source, preserving special flags and avoiding the NULL folio dereference entirely.

03

BranchFixed inPatch commit
6.186.18.20f3caaee0f9e4
6.196.19.10e3133d0986dc
mainline7.0fae654083bfa