CVE-2026-23375
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: mm: thp: deny THP for files on anonymous inodes file_thp_enabled() incorrectly allows THP for files on anonymous inodes (e.g. guest_memfd and secretmem).
Does this matter?
Lower severity and a low EPSS score (0.12%). Track it; it rarely justifies an emergency change on its own.
Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: mm: thp: deny THP for files on anonymous inodes file_thp_enabled() incorrectly allows THP for files on anonymous inodes (e.g. guest_memfd and secretmem). These files are created via alloc_file_pseudo(), which does not call get_write_access() and leaves inode->i_writecount at 0. Combined with S_ISREG(inode->i_mode) being true, they appear as read-only regular files when CONFIG_READ_ONLY_THP_FOR_FS is enabled, making them eligible for THP collapse. Anonymous inodes can never pass the inode_is_open_for_write() check since their i_writecount is never incremented through the normal VFS open path. The right thing to do is to exclude them from THP eligibility altogether, since CONFIG_READ_ONLY_THP_FOR_FS was designed for real filesystem files (e.g. shared libraries), not for pseudo-filesystem inodes. For guest_memfd, this allows khugepaged and MADV_COLLAPSE to create large folios in the page cache via the collapse path, but the guest_memfd fault handler does not support large folios. This triggers WARN_ON_ONCE(folio_test_large(folio)) in kvm_gmem_fault_user_mapping(). For secretmem, collapse_file() tries to copy page contents through the direct map, but secretmem pages are removed from the direct map. This can result in a kernel crash: BUG: unable to handle page fault for address: ffff88810284d000 RIP: 0010:memcpy_orig+0x16/0x130 Call Trace: collapse_file hpage_collapse_scan_file madvise_collapse Secretmem is not affected by the crash on upstream as the memory failure recovery handles the failed copy gracefully, but it still triggers confusing false memory failure reports: Memory failure: 0x106d96f: recovery action for clean unevictable LRU page: Recovered Check IS_ANON_FILE(inode) in file_thp_enabled() to deny THP for all anonymous inode files.
- CVSS 3.1
- 5.5 MEDIUMCVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
- EPSS
- 0.12% probability · 2th percentile
- CISA KEV
- Not listed
- Weakness
- CWE-617
- Affected
- linux/linux kernel
- Source
- 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67
References
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/0524ee56af2c9bfbad152a810f1ca95de8ca00d7Patch
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/08de46a75f91a6661bc1ce0a93614f4bc313c581Patch
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/dd085fe9a8ebfc5d10314c60452db38d2b75e609Patch
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/f6fa05f0dddd387417d0c28281ddb951582514d6Patch
Source: NVD record, EPSS from FIRST.org, KEV from CISA. Refreshed daily.