Spurious warnings via benign page-table teardown race
Published Oct 18, 2026 · Updated Oct 18, 2026
Linux arm64 KVM contains a teardown race that allows local users to trigger false warnings during nested guest shutdown. In arch/arm64/kvm/mmu.c, stage2_apply_range() treats page-table removal during a lock release as an error, causing __unmap_stage2_range() to issue WARN_ON(). The observed trigger requires host memory pressure and concurrent nested-guest teardown; upstream describes the race as benign and establishes no impact beyond the warning.
Summary
What happened
Linux arm64 KVM contains a teardown race that allows local users to trigger false warnings during nested guest shutdown. In arch/arm64/kvm/mmu.c, stage2_apply_range() treats page-table removal during a lock release as an error, causing __unmap_stage2_range() to issue WARN_ON(). The observed trigger requires host memory pressure and concurrent nested-guest teardown; upstream describes the race as benign and establishes no impact beyond the warning.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2026-98468
- Published
- Oct 18, 2026
- Updated
- Oct 18, 2026
- Vendor
- The Linux Kernel Organization
- Product
- Linux
- Classifications
- Unavailable
- Attack vector
- local
- Privileges
- Unavailable
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Oct 18, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Oct 18, 2026Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
Present is not the same as exploitable
Compare your product and version with the public record. A matching version still requires validation against your environment.
Is a vulnerable build present?
Compare these published version ranges with your installed build and any vendor patches.
- Affected versionversion=6.11
- Affected versionversion=ec14c272408af43d392f65f55e66f3b94fc61921 <330346dda3bf5f8a3b06723024f7d906326270cf
- Affected versionversion=ec14c272408af43d392f65f55e66f3b94fc61921 <38b70fc453c3112f1a62583b89903ae41116cc27
- Affected versionversion=ec14c272408af43d392f65f55e66f3b94fc61921 <c23ed110d27ba99cf3a881986514f79aacedf476
- Affected versionversion=ec14c272408af43d392f65f55e66f3b94fc61921 <f44a92633136b409ebb9b7036fceb7e11de60a20
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Published CVSS scores
No CVSS assessment is available in this record.
CVSS describes severity. EPSS estimates exploitation probability.
Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.
Activity data is delayed. The latest report is Sep 28, 2026.
Weakness, pattern, technique
No sourced classifications are available.
Public exploit references
No public exploit references are available in this record.
Labels summarize the accepted research assessment. They do not indicate a test against your environment.
Technologies
Your stack
See the directory against your own environment.
Your stack
Check the software in your environment
Get started to see how Hinoki identifies affected software and validates exploitability in your environment.
Get started