# CVE-2022-4144: Denial of service in QEMU (QXL device)

> A malicious guest user can crash the QEMU host process via an out-of-bounds read in the QXL display device emulation, causing a denial of service.

- **Severity:** Medium 6.5 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:N/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Any signed-in user
- **Attackable:** Local or same network only
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 29 Nov 2022
- **Updated:** 14 Apr 2025
- **Also known as:** ALSA-2023:0099, AZL-11522, AZL-35164, DEBIAN-CVE-2022-4144, GHSA-rc5v-q774-439g, OESA-2022-2136, RHSA-2023:0099, RHSA-2023:0432, RLSA-2023:0099, SUSE-SU-2023:0877-1, UBUNTU-CVE-2022-4144

## What is CVE-2022-4144?

CVE-2022-4144 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Fedoraproject Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux, published on 29 Nov 2022. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

An out-of-bounds read flaw was found in the QXL display device emulation in QEMU. The qxl_phys2virt() function does not check the size of the structure pointed to by the guest physical address, potentially reading past the end of the bar space into adjacent pages. A malicious guest user could use this flaw to crash the QEMU process on the host causing a denial of service condition.

Weakness: CWE-125 (Out-of-bounds Read)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2022-4144?

It affects 4 products.


| Package | Ecosystem | Affected | Fixed in |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| `SLOF` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 20210217-1.module_el8.6.0+2880+7d9e3703 |
| `hivex` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.3.18-23.module_el8.6.0+2880+7d9e3703 |
| `hivex` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.3.18-23.module_el8.6.0+3161+a07c0ea5 |
| `hivex-devel` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.3.18-23.module_el8.6.0+2880+7d9e3703 |
| `hivex-devel` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.3.18-23.module_el8.6.0+3161+a07c0ea5 |
| `libguestfs` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-appliance` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-bash-completion` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-devel` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-gfs2` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-gobject` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-gobject-devel` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-inspect-icons` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-java` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-java-devel` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-javadoc` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-man-pages-ja` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-man-pages-uk` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-rescue` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-rsync` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-tools` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-tools-c` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libguestfs-winsupport` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 8.6-1.module_el8.6.0+2880+7d9e3703 |
| `libguestfs-winsupport` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 8.6-1.module_el8.6.0+3161+a07c0ea5 |
| `libguestfs-xfs` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1:1.44.0-9.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb.alma |
| `libiscsi` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.18.0-8.module_el8.6.0+2880+7d9e3703 |
| `libiscsi` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.18.0-8.module_el8.6.0+3161+a07c0ea5 |
| `libiscsi-devel` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.18.0-8.module_el8.6.0+2880+7d9e3703 |
| `libiscsi-devel` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.18.0-8.module_el8.6.0+3161+a07c0ea5 |
| `libiscsi-utils` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.18.0-8.module_el8.6.0+2880+7d9e3703 |
| `libiscsi-utils` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.18.0-8.module_el8.6.0+3161+a07c0ea5 |
| `libnbd` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.6.0-5.module_el8.6.0+2880+7d9e3703 |
| `libnbd` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.6.0-5.module_el8.6.0+3161+a07c0ea5 |
| `libnbd-bash-completion` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.6.0-5.module_el8.6.0+2880+7d9e3703 |
| `libnbd-devel` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.6.0-5.module_el8.6.0+2880+7d9e3703 |
| `libnbd-devel` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 1.6.0-5.module_el8.6.0+3161+a07c0ea5 |
| `libtpms` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 0.9.1-1.20211126git1ff6fe1f43.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb |
| `libtpms-devel` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 0.9.1-1.20211126git1ff6fe1f43.module_el8.7.0+3346+68867adb |
| `libvirt` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 8.0.0-10.1.module_el8.7.0+3387+571b583b |
| `libvirt-client` | AlmaLinux:8 | All versions | 8.0.0-10.1.module_el8.7.0+3387+571b583b |

Products: Fedoraproject Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux, Fedoraproject Fedora, Qemu Qemu, Redhat Enterprise Linux.

## How do I fix CVE-2022-4144?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2022-4144 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2022-4144 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Fedoraproject Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux

- [CVE-2023-34152](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-34152/): Command injection in ImageMagick (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2022-4170](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-4170/): Code injection in rxvt-unicode (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2022-40315](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-40315/): Moodle Minor SQL injection risk in admin user browsing (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2022-45152](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-45152/): Moodle blind Server-Side Request Forgery (SSRF) vulnerability in LTI provider library (critical 9.1)
- [CVE-2022-24882](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-24882/): Server side NTLM does not properly check parameters in FreeRDP (critical 9.1)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2022-4144 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2022-4144 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Fedoraproject Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux, published on 29 Nov 2022. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2022-4144 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Fedoraproject Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-4144/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-4144/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2022-4144
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2022-4144
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2022-4144

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-4144/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.