In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
mm/page_reporting: use system_freezable_wq to fix UAF during suspend
During PM freeze (e.g. S3 suspend or S4 hibernation), device drivers like
virtio_balloon reset their underlying virtio devices and delete their
virtqueues via vdev->config->del_vqs().
However, page reporting work (page_reporting_process) was scheduled on the
global system_wq. Because system_wq lacks the WQ_FREEZABLE flag, the PM
freezer skips it, leaving page_reporting_process active during suspend.
If pages are freed into the buddy allocator while suspending (for example,
when core MM invokes the balloon shrinker during S4 hibernation image
saving), page reporting triggers virtballoon_free_page_report() on deleted
virtqueues, resulting in a Use-After-Free / General Protection Fault:
[ 196.795226] general protection fault, probably for non-canonical address 0xaa1436fe70dae6df: 0000 [#1] SMP NOPTI
[ 196.825967] Workqueue: events page_reporting_process
[ 196.831038] RIP: 0010:virtqueue_add_split+0x233/0x4c0 [virtio_ring]
[ 196.927073] virtballoon_free_page_report+0x3a/0xe0 [virtio_balloon]
[ 196.946943] page_reporting_process+0x370/0x4f0
Fix this by switching page reporting work to system_freezable_wq. This
ensures that the PM freezer pauses page_reporting_process before device
drivers destroy their reporting virtqueues. Because the reporting worker
is frozen, memory reclamation/freeing (e.g. via shrinker execution) can
safely return pages to MM during freeze without triggering unfrozen
reporting work on deleted virtqueues.
This aligns with the driver's existing design. The comment in
virtballoon_freeze() states:
/*
* The workqueue is already frozen by the PM core before this
* function is called.
*/
Testing:
I have verified these fixes using Google’s virtualization infrastructure
by running continuous suspend/resume iterations (40+ cycles) while
churning memory using stress-ng (`stress-ng --vm 4 --vm-bytes 60%
--timeout 1`) to constantly create free pages for the buddy allocator. We
also set the `page_reporting_order` parameter to 0 to make the page
reporting worker highly sensitive, forcing it to pick up any 4K free
pages. This confirmed that the UAF crashes are no longer reproducible.
mm/page_reporting: use system_freezable_wq to fix UAF during suspend
During PM freeze (e.g. S3 suspend or S4 hibernation), device drivers like
virtio_balloon reset their underlying virtio devices and delete their
virtqueues via vdev->config->del_vqs().
However, page reporting work (page_reporting_process) was scheduled on the
global system_wq. Because system_wq lacks the WQ_FREEZABLE flag, the PM
freezer skips it, leaving page_reporting_process active during suspend.
If pages are freed into the buddy allocator while suspending (for example,
when core MM invokes the balloon shrinker during S4 hibernation image
saving), page reporting triggers virtballoon_free_page_report() on deleted
virtqueues, resulting in a Use-After-Free / General Protection Fault:
[ 196.795226] general protection fault, probably for non-canonical address 0xaa1436fe70dae6df: 0000 [#1] SMP NOPTI
[ 196.825967] Workqueue: events page_reporting_process
[ 196.831038] RIP: 0010:virtqueue_add_split+0x233/0x4c0 [virtio_ring]
[ 196.927073] virtballoon_free_page_report+0x3a/0xe0 [virtio_balloon]
[ 196.946943] page_reporting_process+0x370/0x4f0
Fix this by switching page reporting work to system_freezable_wq. This
ensures that the PM freezer pauses page_reporting_process before device
drivers destroy their reporting virtqueues. Because the reporting worker
is frozen, memory reclamation/freeing (e.g. via shrinker execution) can
safely return pages to MM during freeze without triggering unfrozen
reporting work on deleted virtqueues.
This aligns with the driver's existing design. The comment in
virtballoon_freeze() states:
/*
* The workqueue is already frozen by the PM core before this
* function is called.
*/
Testing:
I have verified these fixes using Google’s virtualization infrastructure
by running continuous suspend/resume iterations (40+ cycles) while
churning memory using stress-ng (`stress-ng --vm 4 --vm-bytes 60%
--timeout 1`) to constantly create free pages for the buddy allocator. We
also set the `page_reporting_order` parameter to 0 to make the page
reporting worker highly sensitive, forcing it to pick up any 4K free
pages. This confirmed that the UAF crashes are no longer reproducible.
Default status is the baseline for the product, each version can override it (e.g. patched versions marked unaffected).
| Vendor | Product | Default status | Versions | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Linux | Linux | unaffected |
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Linux | Linux | affected |
|
No data.
No data.
OpenCVE Enrichment is a feature of OpenCVE that uses AI to automatically link vendors and products to CVEs. Learn more on GitHub.
No data.
Advisories
No advisories yet.
Fixes
Solution
No solution given by the vendor.
Workaround
No workaround given by the vendor.
References
History
Sat, 15 Aug 2026 16:00:00 +0000
| Type | Values Removed | Values Added |
|---|---|---|
| Weaknesses | CWE-416 |
Sat, 15 Aug 2026 12:45:00 +0000
| Type | Values Removed | Values Added |
|---|---|---|
| Description | In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: mm/page_reporting: use system_freezable_wq to fix UAF during suspend During PM freeze (e.g. S3 suspend or S4 hibernation), device drivers like virtio_balloon reset their underlying virtio devices and delete their virtqueues via vdev->config->del_vqs(). However, page reporting work (page_reporting_process) was scheduled on the global system_wq. Because system_wq lacks the WQ_FREEZABLE flag, the PM freezer skips it, leaving page_reporting_process active during suspend. If pages are freed into the buddy allocator while suspending (for example, when core MM invokes the balloon shrinker during S4 hibernation image saving), page reporting triggers virtballoon_free_page_report() on deleted virtqueues, resulting in a Use-After-Free / General Protection Fault: [ 196.795226] general protection fault, probably for non-canonical address 0xaa1436fe70dae6df: 0000 [#1] SMP NOPTI [ 196.825967] Workqueue: events page_reporting_process [ 196.831038] RIP: 0010:virtqueue_add_split+0x233/0x4c0 [virtio_ring] [ 196.927073] virtballoon_free_page_report+0x3a/0xe0 [virtio_balloon] [ 196.946943] page_reporting_process+0x370/0x4f0 Fix this by switching page reporting work to system_freezable_wq. This ensures that the PM freezer pauses page_reporting_process before device drivers destroy their reporting virtqueues. Because the reporting worker is frozen, memory reclamation/freeing (e.g. via shrinker execution) can safely return pages to MM during freeze without triggering unfrozen reporting work on deleted virtqueues. This aligns with the driver's existing design. The comment in virtballoon_freeze() states: /* * The workqueue is already frozen by the PM core before this * function is called. */ Testing: I have verified these fixes using Google’s virtualization infrastructure by running continuous suspend/resume iterations (40+ cycles) while churning memory using stress-ng (`stress-ng --vm 4 --vm-bytes 60% --timeout 1`) to constantly create free pages for the buddy allocator. We also set the `page_reporting_order` parameter to 0 to make the page reporting worker highly sensitive, forcing it to pick up any 4K free pages. This confirmed that the UAF crashes are no longer reproducible. | |
| Title | mm/page_reporting: use system_freezable_wq to fix UAF during suspend | |
| First Time appeared |
Linux
Linux linux Kernel |
|
| CPEs | cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:* | |
| Vendors & Products |
Linux
Linux linux Kernel |
|
| References |
|
|
Projects
Sign in to view the affected projects.
MITRE
Status: PUBLISHED
Assigner: Linux
Published:
Updated: 2026-08-15T12:27:14.441Z
Reserved: 2026-08-15T05:44:03.904Z
Link: CVE-2026-74481
Vulnrichment
No data.
NVD
Status : Received
Published: 2026-08-15T13:17:52.930
Modified: 2026-08-15T13:17:52.930
Link: CVE-2026-74481
Redhat
No data.
OpenCVE Enrichment
Updated: 2026-08-15T15:45:06Z
Weaknesses