Linux Kernel up to 7.1.7 RISC-V Memory Management mm/sparse.c sparse_init encoding error

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability marked as critical has been reported in Linux Kernel up to 7.1.7. This issue affects the function sparse_init of the file mm/sparse.c of the component RISC-V Memory Management. This manipulation causes encoding error. This vulnerability is handled as CVE-2026-80682. The attack can be initiated remotely. There is not any exploit available.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability classified as critical was found in Linux Kernel up to 7.1.7. Affected by this vulnerability is the function sparse_init of the file mm/sparse.c of the component RISC-V Memory Management. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a encoding error vulnerability. The CWE definition for the vulnerability is CWE-172. The product does not properly encode or decode the data, resulting in unexpected values. As an impact it is known to affect availability. The summary by CVE is:

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: riscv/mm: use physical alignment for vmemmap_start_pfn RISC-V computes vmemmap_start_pfn by rounding phys_ram_base down to VMEMMAP_ADDR_ALIGN. That alignment must therefore be expressed in the physical-address domain. Commit 476849b0fba4 ("riscv/mm: align vmemmap to maximal folio size") attempted to account for the maximal folio alignment by feeding MAX_FOLIO_VMEMMAP_ALIGN directly into VMEMMAP_ADDR_ALIGN. However, MAX_FOLIO_VMEMMAP_ALIGN is measured in bytes of struct page storage, whereas VMEMMAP_ADDR_ALIGN is used to align a physical address. The mask-based compound_info encoding requires pfn_to_page(0) to be naturally aligned to MAX_FOLIO_VMEMMAP_ALIGN. Commit 9f94db4c7eaa ("mm/sparse: check memmap alignment for compound_info_has_mask()") added a check for that requirement and exposed the unit mismatch on systems such as QEMU virt, where the DRAM base is not aligned to MAX_FOLIO_NR_PAGES * PAGE_SIZE. Here is the log: [ 0.000000][ C0] ------------[ cut here ]------------ [ 0.000000][ C0] WARNING: mm/sparse.c:365 at sparse_init+0x58a/0x6fe, CPU#0: swapper/0 [ 0.000000][ C0] Modules linked in: [ 0.000000][ C0] CPU: 0 UID: 0 PID: 0 Comm: swapper Not tainted 7.2.0-rc3-g1d8304bdd65f #2 PREEMPT [ 0.000000][ C0] Hardware name: riscv-virtio,qemu (DT) [ 0.000000][ C0] epc : sparse_init+0x58a/0x6fe [ 0.000000][ C0] ra : sparse_init+0x58a/0x6fe [ 0.000000][ C0] epc : ffffffff86851c88 ra : ffffffff86851c88 sp : ffffffff88807a30 [ 0.000000][ C0] gp : ffffffff8a3bf240 tp : ffffffff88842080 t0 : ff600000ffab6000 [ 0.000000][ C0] t1 : 000000017fab6000 t2 : 65203a6573726363 s0 : ffffffff88807bc0 [ 0.000000][ C0] s1 : 000000000e000000 a0 : 0000000000000007 a1 : 0000000000000000 [ 0.000000][ C0] a2 : 0000000000000002 a3 : ffffffff86851c88 a4 : 0000000000000000 [ 0.000000][ C0] a5 : ffffffff88843080 a6 : 0000000000000003 a7 : 0000000000000000 [ 0.000000][ C0] s2 : ff60000000000000 s3 : 0040000000000000 s4 : 0004000000000000 [ 0.000000][ C0] s5 : ffffffff8a4d92e0 s6 : ff600000ffab55e0 s7 : ffffffff88384d00 [ 0.000000][ C0] s8 : 0000000000000003 s9 : ffffffff88384cc1 s10: ffffffff88384cc0 [ 0.000000][ C0] s11: ffffffff8a4daae0 t3 : ffffffff915e8b20 t4 : ffffffff915e8b20 [ 0.000000][ C0] t5 : ffffffff915e8b20 t6 : ffffffff915e8bc8 ssp : 0000000000000000 [ 0.000000][ C0] status: 0000000200000100 badaddr: ffffffff86851c88 cause: 0000000000000003 [ 0.000000][ C0] [<ffffffff86851c88>] sparse_init+0x58a/0x6fe [ 0.000000][ C0] [<ffffffff8683d396>] mm_core_init_early+0x116/0x1e30 [ 0.000000][ C0] [<ffffffff86801edc>] start_kernel+0xd2/0x848 Convert MAX_FOLIO_VMEMMAP_ALIGN to the equivalent physical alignment before using it in VMEMMAP_ADDR_ALIGN. This keeps the existing round_down() logic while making the resulting vmemmap base satisfy the mask-alignment requirement.

It is possible to read the advisory at git.kernel.org. This vulnerability is known as CVE-2026-80682 since 08/26/2026. The exploitation appears to be easy. The attack can be launched remotely. The exploitation doesn't need any form of authentication. Technical details of the vulnerability are known, but there is no available exploit. The pricing for an exploit might be around USD $0-$5k at the moment (estimation calculated on 08/28/2026).

Upgrading to version 7.1.8 eliminates this vulnerability. Applying the patch 11ad86830a78ea4e1942afc73c10e4ca8e69e03f/45ebe4540817cb540a59e4dc04014ac5dddc9990 is able to eliminate this problem.

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Productinfo

Type

• Operating System

Vendor

• Linux

Name

• Kernel

Version

• 7.1.0
• 7.1.1
• 7.1.2
• 7.1.3
• 7.1.4
• 7.1.5
• 7.1.6
• 7.1.7

License

• open-source

Website

• Vendor: https://www.kernel.org/

CPE 2.3info

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