CVE-2026-72288 KVM: arm64: vgic: Handle race between interrupt affinity change and LPI disabling
A race condition in the Linux kernel's KVM arm64 virtual interrupt controller allows attackers to trigger a use-after-free, potentially leading to code execution or privilege escalation.
- Exploited in the wild
- Not known
- Login needed
- Not needed
- Attackable
- Local or same network only
- Victim action needed
- Not needed
- Fix
- Available
What is CVE-2026-72288?
CVE-2026-72288 is a critical use after free vulnerability in Linux, published on 15 Aug 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:
KVM: arm64: vgic: Handle race between interrupt affinity change and LPI disabling
Hyunwoo Kim reports some really bad races should the following situation occur:
- LPI-I is pending in vcpu-B's AP list - vcpu-A writes to vcpu-B's RD to disable its LPIs - vcpu-C moves I from B to C
If the last two race nicely enough, vgic_prune_ap_list() can drop the irq and AP list locks, reacquire them, and in the interval the irq has been freed. UAF follows.
The fix is two-fold:
- Before dropping the irq and ap_list locks, take a reference on the irq
- Do not try to handle migration of the pending bit: there is no expectation that this state is retained, as per the architecture
With that, we're sure that the interrupt is still around, and we safely remove it from the AP list as it has no target at this stage (unless another interrupt fires, but that's another story).
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-72288?
How do I fix CVE-2026-72288?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Upgrade to the fixed version. These bugs are found with fuzzing and sanitisers and avoided by memory-safe languages. More about Use after free.
Is CVE-2026-72288 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-72288 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as BELL-CVE-2026-72288, DEBIAN-CVE-2026-72288, GHSA-9726-h75p-mc3x, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-72288.