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authorEJ Campbell <ejc3@meta.com>2026-09-29 11:12:32 -0700
committerPaolo Bonzini <pbonzini@redhat.com>2026-10-14 16:10:15 +0200
commit81d99abe2bd81379abfb595e403bbbee6fbfc624 (patch)
tree84e0d2aeaf9402e2a050ee630698d676957552a2 /arch
parent4056b3c9d3c92ea45955641dbafeb9b960e146ef (diff)
x86/kvm: Don't consume async #PF flags on a kernel #PF in NMI context
An async #PF "page not present" event arrives through the #PF vector, and its reason sits in the per-CPU apf_reason.flags until __kvm_handle_async_pf() reads and clears it. If an NMI arrives after the event is injected and before the #PF handler reads the flags, and the NMI handler itself takes a #PF, that fault reads and clears the flags belonging to the #PF it interrupted. It then finds interrupts disabled in the NMI context it interrupted, and panics: Kernel panic - not syncing: Host injected async #PF in interrupt disabled region Call Trace: <NMI> panic+0x52/0x60 __kvm_handle_async_pf+0xb0/0xb0 exc_page_fault+0x71/0xb0 asm_exc_page_fault+0x27/0x30 RIP: 0010:__get_user_nocheck_8+0x6/0x20 perf_callchain_user+0x147/0x1a0 get_perf_callchain+0x12d/0x1c0 ... perf_event_nmi_handler+0x26/0x50 exc_nmi+0xe8/0x110 RIP: 0010:asm_exc_page_fault+0x0/0x30 </NMI> The last RIP line shows the NMI landing on the first instruction of the #PF entry. perf with user call chains takes such a fault: the sampling NMI walks the user stack with __get_user(), which faults when a saved frame pointer is not a valid user address or the walk runs off the top of the stack. The same window exists when KVM, running as an L1 hypervisor with DELIVERY_AS_PF_VMEXIT, reads the flags itself after a #PF VM-exit. The NMI entry code saves and restores CR2 for this nesting, but not the async #PF reason. Andy Lutomirski described the race, with perf as the example, when async #PF delivery was reworked in 2020 [1]. Saving and clearing the flags across the NMI, next to CR2, was discussed there but not merged. Since that rework, Linux has stopped setting KVM_ASYNC_PF_SEND_ALWAYS, so the host delivers "page not present" only for user mode faults and a kernel-mode fault in NMI context (including kernel-mode #MC and #DB) cannot be an async page fault. In that case, return without touching the flags so that the interrupted handler finds them intact. Tested on v7.3-rc5 in a 4-vCPU, 2 GiB guest restored from a snapshot whose memory is served on demand through userfaultfd, so that reading it back takes async #PFs, while every thread samples hardware cycles with user call chains and points its frame pointer at an unmapped page. Without this patch the guest panicked as above in 3 of 3 runs. With it, the guest survived 3 of 3 runs of 60 seconds, and the host counted 148,441 to 153,334 kvm_async_pf_not_present events in the first 20 seconds of each. On 6.18.50 the results were the same: the guest panicked without the patch and survived with it. Link: https://lore.kernel.org/all/ed71d0967113a35f670a9625a058b8e6e0b2f104.1583547991.git.luto@kernel.org/ [1] Link: https://lore.kernel.org/all/20211126123145.2772-1-jiangshanlai@gmail.com/ [2] Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org # v5.9+ Signed-off-by: EJ Campbell <ejc3@meta.com> Link: https://patch.msgid.link/CADkxfh-uQTca_6jB1JPDq1MsKffF_UKGQR339oQSJNcoV75GNQ@mail.gmail.com Signed-off-by: Paolo Bonzini <pbonzini@redhat.com>
Diffstat (limited to 'arch')
-rw-r--r--arch/x86/kernel/kvm.c32
1 files changed, 29 insertions, 3 deletions
diff --git a/arch/x86/kernel/kvm.c b/arch/x86/kernel/kvm.c
index 6b0a5861ccb8..d8dd2cadcbf7 100644
--- a/arch/x86/kernel/kvm.c
+++ b/arch/x86/kernel/kvm.c
@@ -265,11 +265,39 @@ noinstr u32 kvm_read_and_reset_apf_flags(void)
}
EXPORT_SYMBOL_FOR_KVM(kvm_read_and_reset_apf_flags);
+static __always_inline bool kvm_apf_reason_pending(void)
+{
+ return __this_cpu_read(async_pf_enabled) &&
+ __this_cpu_read(apf_reason.flags);
+}
+
noinstr bool __kvm_handle_async_pf(struct pt_regs *regs, u32 token)
{
- u32 flags = kvm_read_and_reset_apf_flags();
irqentry_state_t state;
+ u32 flags;
+
+ if (!kvm_apf_reason_pending())
+ return false;
+
+ /*
+ * The guest does not enable KVM_ASYNC_PF_SEND_ALWAYS, so the host
+ * delivers async #PF only to user mode (or as a #PF VM-exit, which KVM
+ * reads itself). A #PF from kernel mode can still arrive between that
+ * delivery and the read of the reason flags, inside an NMI that
+ * interrupted it, for instance perf reading user memory for a call
+ * chain. Such a fault is not async, so leave the async PF flags
+ * untouched for the outer handler. Outside NMI context, on the other
+ * hand, async PF flags on a kernel-mode fault mean the host is broken.
+ */
+ if (!user_mode(regs)) {
+ if (likely(in_nmi()))
+ return false;
+ state = irqentry_enter(regs);
+ instrumentation_begin();
+ panic("Host injected async #PF in kernel mode\n");
+ }
+ flags = kvm_read_and_reset_apf_flags();
if (!flags)
return false;
@@ -285,8 +313,6 @@ noinstr bool __kvm_handle_async_pf(struct pt_regs *regs, u32 token)
panic("Host injected async #PF in interrupt disabled region\n");
if (flags & KVM_PV_REASON_PAGE_NOT_PRESENT) {
- if (unlikely(!(user_mode(regs))))
- panic("Host injected async #PF in kernel mode\n");
/* Page is swapped out by the host. */
kvm_async_pf_task_wait_schedule(token);
} else {