CVE-2025-71202 iommu/sva: invalidate stale IOTLB entries for kernel address space
An attacker can exploit stale IOTLB entries in the Linux kernel to achieve code execution or privilege escalation when SVA is enabled.
- 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
What is CVE-2025-71202?
CVE-2025-71202 is a high-severity memory corruption vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 14 Feb 2026. 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:
iommu/sva: invalidate stale IOTLB entries for kernel address space
Introduce a new IOMMU interface to flush IOTLB paging cache entries for the CPU kernel address space. This interface is invoked from the x86 architecture code that manages combined user and kernel page tables, specifically before any kernel page table page is freed and reused.
This addresses the main issue with vfree() which is a common occurrence and can be triggered by unprivileged users. While this resolves the primary problem, it doesn't address some extremely rare case related to memory unplug of memory that was present as reserved memory at boot, which cannot be triggered by unprivileged users. The discussion can be found at the link below.
Enable SVA on x86 architecture since the IOMMU can now receive notification to flush the paging cache before freeing the CPU kernel page table pages.
Weakness: CWE-457
Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-71202?
It affects 1 product.
Products include Linux kernel.
How do I fix CVE-2025-71202?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Upgrade to the fixed version. Memory-safe languages, compiler hardening and fuzzing prevent most new cases. More about Memory corruption.
Is CVE-2025-71202 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-71202 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel
Sources
Also known as AZL-77724, BELL-CVE-2025-71202, DEBIAN-CVE-2025-71202, GHSA-c4h6-jgrf-pj9p, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-11-CVE-2025-71202, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-12-CVE-2025-71202 and 4 more.