In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
vsock/virtio: cap TX credit to local buffer size
The virtio transports derives its TX credit directly from peer_buf_alloc,
which is set from the remote endpoint's SO_VM_SOCKETS_BUFFER_SIZE value.
On the host side this means that the amount of data we are willing to
queue for a connection is scaled by a guest-chosen buffer size, rather
than the host's own vsock configuration. A malicious guest can advertise
a large buffer and read slowly, causing the host to allocate a
correspondingly large amount of sk_buff memory.
The same thing would happen in the guest with a malicious host, since
virtio transports share the same code base.
Introduce a small helper, virtio_transport_tx_buf_size(), that
returns min(peer_buf_alloc, buf_alloc), and use it wherever we consume
peer_buf_alloc.
This ensures the effective TX window is bounded by both the peer's
advertised buffer and our own buf_alloc (already clamped to
buffer_max_size via SO_VM_SOCKETS_BUFFER_MAX_SIZE), so a remote peer
cannot force the other to queue more data than allowed by its own
vsock settings.
On an unpatched Ubuntu 22.04 host (~64 GiB RAM), running a PoC with
32 guest vsock connections advertising 2 GiB each and reading slowly
drove Slab/SUnreclaim from ~0.5 GiB to ~57 GiB; the system only
recovered after killing the QEMU process. That said, if QEMU memory is
limited with cgroups, the maximum memory used will be limited.
With this patch applied:
Before:
MemFree: ~61.6 GiB
Slab: ~142 MiB
SUnreclaim: ~117 MiB
After 32 high-credit connections:
MemFree: ~61.5 GiB
Slab: ~178 MiB
SUnreclaim: ~152 MiB
Only ~35 MiB increase in Slab/SUnreclaim, no host OOM, and the guest
remains responsive.
Compatibility with non-virtio transports:
- VMCI uses the AF_VSOCK buffer knobs to size its queue pairs per
socket based on the local vsk->buffer_* values; the remote side
cannot enlarge those queues beyond what the local endpoint
configured.
- Hyper-V's vsock transport uses fixed-size VMBus ring buffers and
an MTU bound; there is no peer-controlled credit field comparable
to peer_buf_alloc, and the remote endpoint cannot drive in-flight
kernel memory above those ring sizes.
- The loopback path reuses virtio_transport_common.c, so it
naturally follows the same semantics as the virtio transport.
This change is limited to virtio_transport_common.c and thus affects
virtio-vsock, vhost-vsock, and loopback, bringing them in line with the
"remote window intersected with local policy" behaviour that VMCI and
Hyper-V already effectively have.
[Stefano: small adjustments after changing the previous patch]
[Stefano: tweak the commit message]
References
Configurations
Configuration 1 (hide)
|
History
17 Mar 2026, 21:10
| Type | Values Removed | Values Added |
|---|---|---|
| CPE | cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.19:rc5:*:*:*:*:*:* cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.19:rc4:*:*:*:*:*:* cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.19:rc1:*:*:*:*:*:* cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.19:rc2:*:*:*:*:*:* cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:* cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.19:rc6:*:*:*:*:*:* cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.19:rc3:*:*:*:*:*:* |
|
| References | () https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/84ef86aa7120449828d1e0ce438c499014839711 - Patch | |
| References | () https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/8ee784fdf006cbe8739cfa093f54d326cbf54037 - Patch | |
| References | () https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/c0e42fb0e054c2b2ec4ee80f48ccd256ae0227ce - Patch | |
| References | () https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/d9d5f222558b42f6277eafaaa6080966faf37676 - Patch | |
| References | () https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/fef7110ae5617555c792a2bb4d27878d84583adf - Patch | |
| Summary |
|
|
| First Time |
Linux
Linux linux Kernel |
|
| CVSS |
v2 : v3 : |
v2 : unknown
v3 : 5.5 |
| CWE | NVD-CWE-noinfo |
06 Feb 2026, 17:16
| Type | Values Removed | Values Added |
|---|---|---|
| References |
|
04 Feb 2026, 17:16
| Type | Values Removed | Values Added |
|---|---|---|
| New CVE |
Information
Published : 2026-02-04 17:16
Updated : 2026-03-17 21:10
NVD link : CVE-2026-23086
Mitre link : CVE-2026-23086
CVE.ORG link : CVE-2026-23086
JSON object : View
Products Affected
linux
- linux_kernel
CWE
