CVE-2026-72172

NameCVE-2026-72172
DescriptionIn the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: mm/mm_init: fix uninitialized struct pages for ZONE_DEVICE If DAX memory is hotplugged into an unoccupied subsection of an early section, section_activate() reuses the unoptimized boot memmap. However, compound_nr_pages() still assumes that vmemmap optimization is in effect and initializes only the reduced number of struct pages. As a result, the remaining tail struct pages are left uninitialized, which can later lead to unexpected behavior or crashes. Fix this by treating early sections as unoptimized when calculating how many struct pages to initialize.
SourceCVE (at NVD; CERT, ENISA, LWN, oss-sec, fulldisc, Debian ELTS, Red Hat, Ubuntu, Gentoo, SUSE bugzilla/CVE, GitHub advisories/code/issues, web search, more)

Vulnerable and fixed packages

The table below lists information on source packages.

Source PackageReleaseVersionStatus
linux (PTS)bookworm6.1.176-1vulnerable
bookworm (security)6.1.180-1vulnerable
trixie6.12.94-1vulnerable
trixie (security)6.12.107-1fixed
forky7.1.12-1fixed
sid7.1.13-1fixed

The information below is based on the following data on fixed versions.

PackageTypeReleaseFixed VersionUrgencyOriginDebian Bugs
linuxsourcebullseye(not affected)
linuxsourcetrixie6.12.100-1
linuxsource(unstable)7.1.5-1

Notes

[bullseye] - linux <not-affected> (Vulnerable code not present)
https://git.kernel.org/linus/cd681403a87085562499d60325b7b45d3be11217 (7.2-rc1)

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