CVE-2026-98471: KVM: SEV: Do cache maintenance on the source VM during intra-host migration

Severity: high (CVSS 7.1 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: 2026-10-18 · updated 2026-10-24

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: KVM: SEV: Do cache maintenance on the source VM during intra-host migration Manually perform cache maintenance on the source VM during intra-host migration to ensure no stale data is left in CPU caches after the VM is destroyed. Because the source VM is "converted" to a non-SEV VM, KVM's memory reclaim flows won't trigger cache maintenance, e.g. when all guest memory is reclaimed in response to detaching from the mmu_notifier. Note, relying on the destination VM to do cache maintenance isn't an option as KVM doesn't require identical guest memory configurations, i.e. the source VM may have access to memory that the destination VM does not. Enforcing equivalent memory configurations is infeasible, as it would require a *deep* comparison of memslots, e.g. to verify that not only are the memslot identical, but what the memslots point at is also identical.

Affected products

Linux kernel: 5.16 — fixed in 7.3

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: Linux kernel 7.3. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

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