# CVE-2024-50099: arm64: probes: Remove broken LDR (literal) uprobe support

> A flaw in Linux kernel arm64 uprobes allows local attackers to trigger a kernel panic or lockup by exploiting unsafe memory access patterns in literal load simulations.

- **Severity:** High 7.3 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:L/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:** 5 Nov 2024
- **Updated:** 5 Aug 2026
- **Also known as:** AZL-52555, AZL-52578, BELL-CVE-2024-50099, DEBIAN-CVE-2024-50099, GHSA-pj67-hxcx-g74v, UBUNTU-CVE-2024-50099

## What is CVE-2024-50099?

CVE-2024-50099 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 5 Nov 2024. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

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

arm64: probes: Remove broken LDR (literal) uprobe support

The simulate_ldr_literal() and simulate_ldrsw_literal() functions are
unsafe to use for uprobes. Both functions were originally written for
use with kprobes, and access memory with plain C accesses. When uprobes
was added, these were reused unmodified even though they cannot safely
access user memory.

There are three key problems:

1) The plain C accesses do not have corresponding extable entries, and
   thus if they encounter a fault the kernel will treat these as
   unintentional accesses to user memory, resulting in a BUG() which
   will kill the kernel thread, and likely lead to further issues (e.g.
   lockup or panic()).

2) The plain C accesses are subject to HW PAN and SW PAN, and so when
   either is in use, any attempt to simulate an access to user memory
   will fault. Thus neither simulate_ldr_literal() nor
   simulate_ldrsw_literal() can do anything useful when simulating a
   user instruction on any system with HW PAN or SW PAN.

3) The plain C accesses are privileged, as they run in kernel context,
   and in practice can access a small range of kernel virtual addresses.
   The instructions they simulate have a range of +/-1MiB, and since the
   simulated instructions must itself be a user instructions in the
   TTBR0 address range, these can address the final 1MiB of the TTBR1
   acddress range by wrapping downwards from an address in the first
   1MiB of the TTBR0 address range.

   In contemporary kernels the last 8MiB of TTBR1 address range is
   reserved, and accesses to this will always fault, meaning this is no
   worse than (1).

   Historically, it was theoretically possible for the linear map or
   vmemmap to spill into the final 8MiB of the TTBR1 address range, but
   in practice this is extremely unlikely to occur as this would
   require either:

   * Having enough physical memory to fill the entire linear map all the
     way to the final 1MiB of the TTBR1 address range.

   * Getting unlucky with KASLR randomization of the linear map such
     that the populated region happens to overlap with the last 1MiB of
     the TTBR address range.

   ... and in either case if we were to spill into the final page there
   would be larger problems as the final page would alias with error
   pointers.

Practically speaking, (1) and (2) are the big issues. Given there have
been no reports of problems since the broken code was introduced, it
appears that no-one is relying on probing these instructions with
uprobes.

Avoid these issues by not allowing uprobes on LDR (literal) and LDRSW
(literal), limiting the use of simulate_ldr_literal() and
simulate_ldrsw_literal() to kprobes. Attempts to place uprobes on LDR
(literal) and LDRSW (literal) will be rejected as
arm_probe_decode_insn() will return INSN_REJECTED. In future we can
consider introducing working uprobes support for these instructions, but
this will require more significant work.

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2024-50099?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Linux kernel.

## How do I fix CVE-2024-50099?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2024-50099 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2024-50099 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel

- [CVE-2026-53266](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-53266/): Linux Kernel Out-of-Bounds Write (high 8.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2013-6282](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2013-6282/): Linux Kernel Improper Input Validation (high 8.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2022-0185](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-0185/): Linux Kernel Heap-Based Buffer Overflow (high 8.4, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2013-2094](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2013-2094/): Linux Kernel Privilege Escalation (high 8.4, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2026-53362](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-53362/): Linux Kernel Unspecified (high 7.8, exploited in the wild)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2024-50099 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2024-50099 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 5 Nov 2024. 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-2024-50099 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Linux kernel. 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-2024-50099/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-50099/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2024-50099
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2024-50099
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2024-50099

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-50099/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.
