{"id":"CVE-2026-64130","url":"https://www.cyber-defence.io/tools/cve/CVE-2026-64130","generatedAt":"2026-10-28T08:10:51.483Z","title":"In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: mm/page_alloc: fix initialization of tags of the huge zero folio with init_on_free __GFP_ZEROTAGS semantics are currently a bit weird, but effectively this flag is only ever set…","description":"In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:\n\nmm/page_alloc: fix initialization of tags of the huge zero folio with init_on_free\n\n__GFP_ZEROTAGS semantics are currently a bit weird, but effectively this\nflag is only ever set alongside __GFP_ZERO and __GFP_SKIP_KASAN.\n\nIf we run with init_on_free, we will zero out pages during\n__free_pages_prepare(), to skip zeroing on the allocation path.\n\nHowever, when allocating with __GFP_ZEROTAG set, post_alloc_hook() will\nconsequently not only skip clearing page content, but also skip clearing\ntag memory.\n\nNot clearing tags through __GFP_ZEROTAGS is irrelevant for most pages that\nwill get mapped to user space through set_pte_at() later: set_pte_at() and\nfriends will detect that the tags have not been initialized yet\n(PG_mte_tagged not set), and initialize them.\n\nHowever, for the huge zero folio, which will be mapped through a PMD\nmarked as special, this initialization will not be performed, ending up\nexposing whatever tags were still set for the pages.\n\nThe docs (Documentation/arch/arm64/memory-tagging-extension.rst) state\nthat allocation tags are set to 0 when a page is first mapped to user\nspace.  That no longer holds with the huge zero folio when init_on_free is\nenabled.\n\nFix it by decoupling __GFP_ZEROTAGS from __GFP_ZERO, passing to\ntag_clear_highpages() whether we want to also clear page content.\n\nInvert the meaning of the tag_clear_highpages() return value to have\nclearer semantics.\n\nReproduced with the huge zero folio by modifying the check_buffer_fill\narm64/mte selftest to use a 2 MiB area, after making sure that pages have\na non-0 tag set when freeing (note that, during boot, we will not actually\ninitialize tags, but only set KASAN_TAG_KERNEL in the page flags).\n\n\t$ ./check_buffer_fill\n\t1..20\n\t...\n\tnot ok 17 Check initial tags with private mapping, sync error mode and mmap memory\n\tnot ok 18 Check initial tags with private mapping, sync error mode and mmap/mprotect memory\n\t...\n\nThis code needs more cleanups; we'll tackle that next, like\ndecoupling __GFP_ZEROTAGS from __GFP_SKIP_KASAN.\n\n[akpm@linux-foundation.org: s/__GPF_ZERO/__GFP_ZERO/, per David]","published":"2026-07-19T16:17:55.000Z","lastModified":"2026-08-13T15:10:33.000Z","status":"Analyzed","sourceIdentifier":"416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67","cvss":{"version":"3.1","score":5.5,"severity":"MEDIUM","vector":"CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H"},"cwe":["CWE-908"],"affected":["linux/linux kernel"],"epss":{"score":0.0016,"percentile":0.05132,"date":"2026-10-27","history":[]},"kev":{"listed":false},"exploits":{"count":0,"verified":false,"firstPublished":null,"source":"Exploit-DB (https://gitlab.com/exploit-database/exploitdb)","entries":[]},"verdict":{"level":"low","text":"Lower severity and a low EPSS score (0.16%). Track it; it rarely justifies an emergency change on its own."},"changes":[],"references":[{"url":"https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/2f2aec5120b93a8f8b52dc50cdc60dbb8aec72f6","tags":["Patch"],"source":"416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67"},{"url":"https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/6a288a4ddb4a994490505ab5f41c445f8e6b6467","tags":["Patch"],"source":"416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67"},{"url":"https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/738d18f1da3513d17b6f7bf30146cc4ac2480ffd","tags":["Patch"],"source":"416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67"}],"sources":{"nvd":"https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-64130","epss":"https://www.first.org/epss/","kev":"https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog","exploitdb":"https://www.exploit-db.com/"},"licence":"CC BY 4.0 — link back to the CVE Explorer if you publish the results; upstream data remains subject to its own terms."}