VulnerabilityPublished 18 Oct 2026

CVE-2026-98468: Linux kernel · KVM: arm64: Fix spurious warning for benign stage 2 teardown race

Affects Linux kernelSource CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · fixed in f44a92633136b409ebb9b7036fceb7e11de60a20 : update Linux kernel when convenient.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 17:16 UTC

Severity

Low

Rated Low by Threat Radar's AI analysis · CVSS not yet scored by NVD

EPSS: 0.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 10% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.
Patch: Available – fixed in f44a92633136b409ebb9b7036fceb7e11de60a20, c23ed110d27ba99cf3a881986514f79aacedf476, 330346dda3bf5f8a3b06723024f7d906326270cf +1

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 18 Oct 2026
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by Mirage: no evidence on record.
No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 26 Oct 2026.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, or CISA SSVC or the CVSS exploit maturity reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

What to do

Upgrade Linux kernel to f44a92633136b409ebb9b7036fceb7e11de60a20, c23ed110d27ba99cf3a881986514f79aacedf476, 330346dda3bf5f8a3b06723024f7d906326270cf or 38b70fc453c3112f1a62583b89903ae41116cc27.

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
LinuxLinux	Affected ≥ ec14c272408af43d392f65f55e66f3b94fc61921, < f44a92633136b409ebb9b7036fceb7e11de60a20	Fixed in f44a92633136b409ebb9b7036fceb7e11de60a20
LinuxLinux	Affected ≥ ec14c272408af43d392f65f55e66f3b94fc61921, < c23ed110d27ba99cf3a881986514f79aacedf476	Fixed in c23ed110d27ba99cf3a881986514f79aacedf476
LinuxLinux	Affected ≥ ec14c272408af43d392f65f55e66f3b94fc61921, < 330346dda3bf5f8a3b06723024f7d906326270cf	Fixed in 330346dda3bf5f8a3b06723024f7d906326270cf
LinuxLinux	Affected ≥ ec14c272408af43d392f65f55e66f3b94fc61921, < 38b70fc453c3112f1a62583b89903ae41116cc27	Fixed in 38b70fc453c3112f1a62583b89903ae41116cc27
LinuxLinux	Affected =6.11	Fixed in–

AI-suggested

A fix is available in the Linux kernel after version 6.11, as indicated by the fixed commits. Users should update to a kernel version that includes these fixes to eliminate the spurious warning. No other mitigation actions are required since the warning is benign and does not indicate a security risk.

Description

CVE-2026-98468 addresses a spurious warning in the Linux kernel's KVM arm64 implementation related to a benign race condition during stage 2 page table teardown. The warning occurs under memory pressure when concurrent operations on stage 2 page tables race, causing a false error report. The fix updates the code to no longer treat this race as an error, while preserving warnings for other genuine error conditions.

Impact

The impact is limited to a spurious warning message during memory pressure scenarios involving nested virtualization on arm64 architecture. There is no indication of a security breach, data corruption, or denial of service. The race condition is benign and handled correctly by the kernel, so this fix improves stability and reduces misleading kernel warnings without changing functional behavior.

Summary

This vulnerability involves a benign race condition in the Linux kernel's KVM arm64 MMU notifier handling during stage 2 page table teardown. Under certain conditions, concurrent threads performing migration and release operations on stage 2 page tables cause a spurious warning triggered by a WARN_ON() in __unmap_stage2_range(). The race is benign and handled correctly, but the warning was incorrectly raised. The fix modifies stage2_apply_range() to recognize concurrent page table teardown on lock release as a legitimate reason to abort without error, preventing the spurious warning while maintaining warnings for other errors. The issue affects Linux kernel version 6.11 and was resolved in subsequent commits.

References

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 26 Oct 2026, 11:05 UTC

Technical details

References

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