What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities
CVE-2021-22543: Improper memory handling in Linux KVM
- Severity: high (CVSS 7.8 v3.1)
- Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
- EPSS: 0.7% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
- Public exploit or detection template: yes
- Published: 2021-05-26 · updated 2026-06-17
- Weakness: CWE-119
Description
An issue was discovered in Linux: KVM through Improper handling of VM_IO|VM_PFNMAP vmas in KVM can bypass RO checks and can lead to pages being freed while still accessible by the VMM and guest. This allows users with the ability to start and control a VM to read/write random pages of memory and can result in local privilege escalation.
Affected products
- Debian Linux: 9.0
- Fedoraproject Fedora: 33, 34
- Linux kernel: 2021-05-18
- NetApp Cloud Backup: all versions
- NetApp H300E Firmware: all versions
- NetApp H300S Firmware: all versions
- NetApp H410C Firmware: all versions
- NetApp H410S Firmware: all versions
- NetApp H500E Firmware: all versions
- NetApp H500S Firmware: all versions
- NetApp H700E Firmware: all versions
- NetApp H700S Firmware: all versions
- NetApp Solidfire Baseboard Management Controller Firmware: all versions
References
- http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2021/06/26/1
- https://github.com/google/security-research/security/advisories/GHSA-7wq5-phmq-m584
- https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2021/10/msg00010.html
- https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2021/12/msg00012.html
- https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/4G5YBUVEPHZYXMKNGBZ3S6INFCTEEL4E/
- https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/ROQIXQB7ZAWI3KSGSHR6H5RDUWZI775S/
- https://security.netapp.com/advisory/ntap-20210708-0002/
- http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2021/06/26/1
- https://github.com/google/security-research/security/advisories/GHSA-7wq5-phmq-m584
- https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2021/10/msg00010.html
- https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2021/12/msg00012.html
- https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/4G5YBUVEPHZYXMKNGBZ3S6INFCTEEL4E/
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