virtio_pci: fix vq info pointer lookup via wrong index
Key facts
- Attack vector
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- Privileges required
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- User interaction
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- Attack complexity
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- Impact type
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- Confidentiality · integrity · availability
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- Fix status
- Partial Red Hat: 1 without a fix
No CVSS vector from any source. Fix status from CNA and Red Hat.
Summary
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: virtio_pci: fix vq info pointer lookup via wrong index Unbinding a virtio balloon device: echo virtio0 > /sys/bus/virtio/drivers/virtio_balloon/unbind triggers a NULL pointer dereference. The dmesg says: BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference, address: 0000000000000008 [...] RIP: 0010:__list_del_entry_valid_or_report+0x5/0xf0 Call Trace: <TASK> vp_del_vqs+0x121/0x230 remove_common+0x135/0x150 virtballoon_remove+0xee/0x100 virtio_dev_remove+0x3b/0x80 device_release_driver_internal+0x187/0x2c0 unbind_store+0xb9/0xe0 kernfs_fop_write_iter.llvm.11660790530567441834+0xf6/0x180 vfs_write+0x2a9/0x3b0 ksys_write+0x5c/0xd0 do_syscall_64+0x54/0x230 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x29/0x31 [...] </TASK> The virtio_balloon device registers 5 queues (inflate, deflate, stats, free_page, reporting) but only the first two are unconditional. The stats, free_page and reporting queues are each conditional on their respective feature bits. When any of these features are absent, the corresponding vqs_info entry has name == NULL, creating holes in the array. The root cause is an indexing mismatch introduced when vq info storage was changed to be passed as an argument. vp_find_vqs_msix() and vp_find_vqs_intx() store the info pointer at vp_dev->vqs[i], where 'i' is the caller's sparse array index. However, the virtqueue itself gets vq->index assigned from queue_idx, a dense index that skips NULL entries. When holes exist, 'i' and queue_idx diverge. Later, vp_del_vqs() looks up info via vp_dev->vqs[vq->index] using the dense index into the sparsely-populated array, and hits NULL. Fix this by storing info at vp_dev->vqs[queue_idx] instead of vp_dev->vqs[i], so the store index matches the lookup index (vq->index). Apply the fix to both the MSIX and INTX paths.
Why it matters now
SSVC decision points
Not available: CISA has not published SSVC decision points for this record.
Affected products
Remediation
- Fix · CNA Linux (Linux) Fixed in 6.12.96, 6.18.39, 7.1.4, 7.2
Vendor assessments
Red Hat
Red Hat rating: Low. Red Hat's page for this CVE →
| Product | Status | Plan or fix |
|---|---|---|
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
Not affected: 4 products
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9
Timeline
- 2026-10-02 Threatist record created from CVE-2026-64457
- 2026-10-03 Alias added: GHSA-gqwv-4rwr-x42g
References
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Sources
- CVE-2026-64457 · CVE Program
- CVE-2026-64457 · NVD
- FIRST EPSS
- GHSA-gqwv-4rwr-x42g · GitHub Advisory Database · CC BY 4.0
- CVE-2026-64457 · Red Hat security data · CC BY 4.0
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