Skip to content
WatchlistHigh

CVE-2026-89754Linux Kernel Out-of-Bounds Write

Linux kernel: mm/pagewalk: fix stale walk->action escaping walk_pmd_range()

Published Sep 11, 2026 · Updated Oct 19, 2026

Key Facts

Patch in the next maintenance window
  • CVE-2026-89754 is a high-severity vulnerability (CVSS 7.8 v3.1) affecting Linux Kernel, Linux (debian), bpftool6.18 (amazon) and 18 more products.
  • It is not listed in any known-exploited vulnerabilities catalog. No public exploit code is known.
  • EPSS estimates a 0.2% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days.
  • Fixed versions are available, including bpftool6.18 1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023, Kernel 6.18.50, Kernel 7.2.4.
  • Brandefense priority: patch in the next maintenance window, because of its high severity, although no exploitation is known.

Scores

CVSS v3.1

7.8

CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

EPSS (30-day exploit likelihood)

0.2%

Higher than 6.3% of all scored CVEs

Exploit maturity

Proof of concept

ATLAS score

37/100

Publication score, see How it works

Exploitation Verdict

KEV listed

Not listed

Federal due date

None

No federal due date

Ransomware use

Not reported

Attributed actors

None named

Exploit & Defence Guidance

Exploit maturity

Proof of concept

Public exploit code

1

Proof-of-concept links

In-the-wild evidence

0

Reports of active use

Description

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

mm/pagewalk: fix stale walk->action escaping walk_pmd_range()

If ->pmd_entry() sets walk->action = ACTION_AGAIN, the pmd_none() check is retried. The PMD entry may be cleared at the point of retry.

In this case, if walk->ops->install_pte is not specified, the code continues to the next PMD entry in the range without resetting walk->action to ACTION_SUBTREE.

This leaves walk->action erroneously set to ACTION_AGAIN, which is incorrect.

This was incorrect but not problematic up until commit 3b89863c3fa4 ("mm/pagewalk: fix race between concurrent split and refault") which updated walk_pud_range() to check for walk->action == ACTION_AGAIN upon walk_pmd_range()'s return, causing the PUD walk to be retried.

In this case this results in duplicate walk callbacks being invoked, which is erroneous and will break any caller that is not idempotent with respect to this (and waste time for those which are). The result is an out-of-bounds write, triggered by a local fuzzer:

[ 2.272695] ================================================================== [ 2.273471] BUG: KASAN: slab-out-of-bounds in mincore_unmapped_range+0x14f/0x190 [ 2.274302] Write of size 1 at addr ffff888008d9b000 by task poc/106 [ 2.274966] [ 2.275154] CPU: 0 UID: 1000 PID: 106 Comm: poc Not tainted 7.2.0-rc6-00429-ga7c7074b58d2 #55 PREEMPT(lazy) [ 2.275159] Hardware name: QEMU Ubuntu 24.04 PC v2 (i440FX + PIIX, arch_caps fix, 1996), BIOS 1.16.3-debian-1.16.3-2 04/01/2014 [ 2.275164] Call Trace: [ 2.275170] [ 2.275172] dump_stack_lvl+0x53/0x70 [ 2.275200] print_report+0xd0/0x630 [ 2.275210] ? pfxraw_spin_lock_irqsave+0x10/0x10 [ 2.275219] ? irqentry_exit+0xd2/0x670 [ 2.275224] ? irqentry_exit+0xd2/0x670 [ 2.275226] ? virt_addr_valid+0xef/0x1a0 [ 2.275239] ? mincore_unmapped_range+0x14f/0x190 [ 2.275242] kasan_report+0xce/0x100 [ 2.275245] ? mincore_unmapped_range+0x14f/0x190 [ 2.275248] mincore_unmapped_range+0x14f/0x190 [ 2.275252] mincore_unmapped_range+0x45/0x70 [ 2.275254] walk_pgd_range+0xafc/0xfc0 [ 2.275261] ? pfx_walk_pgd_range+0x10/0x10 [ 2.275264] ? update_load_avg_se+0x3d1/0x670 [ 2.275275] walk_page_range+0xc0/0x310 [ 2.275278] ? pfx_find_vma+0x10/0x10 [ 2.275281] ? finish_task_switch.isra.0+0x16d/0x4f0 [ 2.275290] walk_page_range_mm_unsafe+0x26f/0x3a0 [ 2.275293] ? pfx_mtree_load+0x10/0x10 [ 2.275298] ? pfx_walk_page_range_mm_unsafe+0x10/0x10 [ 2.275302] ? free_frozen_pages+0x54d/0x7e0 [ 2.275308] do_sys_mincore+0x132/0x380 [ 2.275311] do_syscall_64+0xf9/0x540 [ 2.275316] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f [ 2.275322] RIP: 0033:0x422ccd [ 2.275326] Code: b3 66 2e 0f 1f 84 00 00 00 00 00 66 90 f3 0f 1e fa 48 89 f8 48 89 f7 48 89 d6 48 89 ca 4d 89 c2 4d 89 c8 4c 8b 4c 24 08 0f 05 3d 01 f0 ff ff 73 01 c3 48 c7 c1 b8 ff ff ff f7 d8 64 89 01 48 [ 2.275329] RSP: 002b:00007fffffffec18 EFLAGS: 00000287 ORIG_RAX: 000000000000001b [ 2.275337] RAX: ffffffffffffffda RBX: 0000000000000066 RCX: 0000000000422ccd [ 2.275339] RDX: 00000000004d0940 RSI: 0000000001000000 RDI: 00007ffff4000000 [ 2.275340] RBP: 00000000004d0940 R08: 0000000000000100 R09: 0000000000000100 [ 2.275342] R10: 0000000000000100 R11: 0000000000000287 R12: 20c49ba5e353f7cf [ 2.275343] R13: 00000000004990d3 R14: 0000000000000000 R15: 0000000000000001 [ 2.275346] [ 2.275347] [ 2.296904] The buggy address belongs to the object at ffff888008d9b000 [ 2.296904] which belongs to the cache sigqueue of size 80 [ 2.298151] The buggy address is located 0 bytes inside of [ 2.298151] allocated 80-byte region [ffff888008d9b000, ffff888008d9b050) [ 2.299408] [ 2.299601] The buggy address belongs to the physical page: [ 2.300191] page: refcount:0 mapcount:0 mapping:0000000000000000 index:0x0 pfn:0x8d9b ---truncated---

Affected Products

25 affected entries in total
ProductAffected versionsFixed in
Linux KernelLinuxSee advisory6.18.50
Linuxdebian>= 38ec58670a0c5fc1edabdeccd857e586b7b3f3180
bpftool6.18amazonSee advisory1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023
kernel6.18-debuginfo-common-aarch64amazonSee advisory1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023
kernel6.18-debuginfo-common-x86_64amazonSee advisory1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023
16 more affected products in the full CVE brief

Patched Releases

bpftool6.18

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

Kernel

6.18.50, 7.2.4

kernel-devel

7.2.7-1.1

kernel-livepatch-6.18.51-120.162

1:1.0-0.amzn2023

kernel-macros

7.2.7-1.1

kernel-source

7.2.7-1.1

kernel-source-vanilla

7.2.7-1.1

kernel6.18

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

kernel6.18-debuginfo-common-aarch64

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

kernel6.18-debuginfo-common-x86_64

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

kernel6.18-devel

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

kernel6.18-headers

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

kernel6.18-modules-extra

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

kernel6.18-modules-extra-common

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

kernel6.18-tools

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

kernel6.18-tools-devel

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

Linux

7.2.6-1, 6.18.50, 6.20, 7.2.4, 895cd4ecbb2e03d7583103c65ee5adaae126ed6d, aedf2efd18977e0cef7eb963166e2b1fcc0aa321, c05cdc2ab365b98099386e6c166b9865a4f2a9d3

Linux Kernel

6.18.50, 7.2.4, 7.3-rc1

microvm-kernel6.18

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

perf6.18

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

python3-perf6.18

1:6.18.51-120.162.amzn2023

Timeline

  1. Publicly disclosed

    Sep 11, 2026

  2. Last updated

    Oct 19, 2026

Weakness Type

  • CWE-787 Out-of-bounds Write

References

3 more references in the full CVE brief

FAQ

Common Questions.

Is CVE-2026-89754 On Your Attack Surface?

Brandefense matches it against the products discovered on your perimeter and opens a finding the day a CVE like this is listed.

Request A Demo

Figures as of Oct 19, 2026. Compiled by Brandefense technologies from public vulnerability catalogs; scoring as described in How it works.

To report an error, contact Brandefense.