CVE-2026-89915

CRITICAL
Published Sep 16, 2026 Modified Sep 16, 2026

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: KVM: arm64: Remove VM-wide VNCR mapping counter The global VNCR mapping counter is used to decide whether an L1 provided VNCR page is mapped in L0 on any CPU at the point of dealing with a TLB invalidation. It is incremented when a mapping is made in the fixmap, and decremented when unmapped. As it turns out, this tracking has several flaws: - we are trying to invalidate TLBs, and the mapping is only an opportunistic consequence of the TLB. Checking this counter to decide whether a TLB needs to be invalidated may result in missed invalidations. - an L1 vcpu invalidating its own TLB (a very likely case) will not succeed in invalidating the VNCR pseudo TLB because that page is not mapped in L0 at this stage. Given that this tracking fails at delivering the minimum guarantees that are required and is only a performance optimisation, remove it completely.

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CVSS v3.1 Score

9.3
CRITICAL
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H

References

Frequently Asked Questions

What is CVE-2026-89915? +
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: KVM: arm64: Remove VM-wide VNCR mapping counter The global VNCR mapping counter is used to decide whether an L1 provided VNCR page is mapped in L0 on any CPU at the point of dealing with a TLB invalidation. It is incremented when a mapping is made in the fixmap, and decremented when unmapped. As it turns out, this tracking has several flaws: - we are trying to invalidate TLBs, and the mapping is only an opportunistic consequence of the TLB. Checking this counter to decide whether a TLB needs to be invalidated may result in missed invalidations. - an L1 vcpu invalidating its own TLB (a very likely case) will not succeed in invalidating the VNCR pseudo TLB because that page is not mapped in L0 at this stage. Given that this tracking fails at delivering the minimum guarantees that are required and is only a performance optimisation, remove it completely. It has a CVSS v3.1 base score of 9.3 (CRITICAL).
How severe is CVE-2026-89915? +
CVE-2026-89915 has a CVSS v3.1 score of 9.3 out of 10, rated CRITICAL. This is a critical vulnerability that should be patched immediately.
How do I check if I'm vulnerable to CVE-2026-89915? +
You can use Secably's free Website Scanner to check your website for known vulnerabilities. For infrastructure scanning, use the Port Scanner to identify exposed services that may be affected. Check the vendor advisories linked above for specific patch and version information.

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