CVE-2026-74439: iommu/vt-d: Clear Present bit before tearing down scalable-mode context entry

Severity: critical (CVSS 9.3 v3.1)
Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
EPSS: 0.2% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
Public exploit or detection template: none known
Published: 2026-08-15 · updated 2026-10-16

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: iommu/vt-d: Clear Present bit before tearing down scalable-mode context entry device_pasid_table_teardown() zeroes the 128-bit scalable-mode context entry with context_clear_entry() while the Present bit is still set. This creates a window where the hardware can fetch a torn entry, with some fields already zeroed while Present is still set, leading to unpredictable behavior or spurious faults. The context-cache invalidation is issued only after the entry has been zeroed, and intel_pasid_free_table() then frees the PASID directory pages, so the IOMMU can keep walking a stale Present=1 entry that points at freed memory. While x86 provides strong write ordering, the compiler may reorder the two 64-bit writes to the entry, and the hardware fetch is not guaranteed to be atomic with respect to multiple CPU writes. Commit c1e4f1dccbe9d ("iommu/vt-d: Clear Present bit before tearing down context entry") fixed this exact pattern in domain_context_clear_one() and the copied-context path, but device_pasid_table_teardown() was not converted. Align it with the "Guidance to Software for Invalidations" in the VT-d spec, Section 6.5.3.3, using the same ownership handshake as the sibling fix: clear only the Present bit, flush it to the IOMMU, perform the context-cache invalidation, and only then zero the rest of the entry.

Affected products

Linux kernel: from 6.8.2 before 6.9; 6.9 — fixed in 6.9, 7.2

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: Linux kernel 6.9, 7.2. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

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