CVE-2026-43331

MEDIUM

x86/kexec: Disable KCOV instrumentation after load_segments()

Title source: cna
STIX 2.1

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: x86/kexec: Disable KCOV instrumentation after load_segments() The load_segments() function changes segment registers, invalidating GS base (which KCOV relies on for per-cpu data). When CONFIG_KCOV is enabled, any subsequent instrumented C code call (e.g. native_gdt_invalidate()) begins crashing the kernel in an endless loop. To reproduce the problem, it's sufficient to do kexec on a KCOV-instrumented kernel: $ kexec -l /boot/otherKernel $ kexec -e The real-world context for this problem is enabling crash dump collection in syzkaller. For this, the tool loads a panic kernel before fuzzing and then calls makedumpfile after the panic. This workflow requires both CONFIG_KEXEC and CONFIG_KCOV to be enabled simultaneously. Adding safeguards directly to the KCOV fast-path (__sanitizer_cov_trace_pc()) is also undesirable as it would introduce an extra performance overhead. Disabling instrumentation for the individual functions would be too fragile, so disable KCOV instrumentation for the entire machine_kexec_64.c and physaddr.c. If coverage-guided fuzzing ever needs these components in the future, other approaches should be considered. The problem is not relevant for 32 bit kernels as CONFIG_KCOV is not supported there. [ bp: Space out comment for better readability. ]

Scores

CVSS v3 5.5
EPSS 0.0001
EPSS Percentile 2.3%
Attack Vector LOCAL
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

Details

Status published
Products (10)
Linux/Linux < 6.6
Linux/Linux 0d345996e4cb573f8cc81d49b3ee9a7fd2035bef - 1e3e98596c2769721ade0418434852fb3af4849a
Linux/Linux 0d345996e4cb573f8cc81d49b3ee9a7fd2035bef - 917e3ad3321e75ca0223d5ccf26ceda116aa51e1
Linux/Linux 0d345996e4cb573f8cc81d49b3ee9a7fd2035bef - de05c66fab8847237a9ca216934e56d3ee837f08
Linux/Linux 6.18.22 - 6.18.*
Linux/Linux 6.19.12 - 6.19.*
Linux/Linux 6.6
Linux/Linux 7.0
linux/linux_kernel 7.0 rc1 (6 CPE variants)
linux/linux_kernel 6.6 - 6.18.22
Published May 08, 2026
Tracked Since May 08, 2026