CVE-2022-49557 | x86/fpu: KVM: Set the base guest FPU uABI size to sizeof(struct kvm_xsave)

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: x86/fpu: KVM: Set the base guest FPU uABI size to sizeof(struct kvm_xsave) Set the starting uABI size of KVM's guest FPU to 'struct kvm_xsave', i.e. to KVM's historical uABI size. When saving FPU state for usersapce, KVM (well, now the FPU) sets the FP+SSE bits in the XSAVE header even if the host doesn't support XSAVE. Setting the XSAVE header allows the VM to be migrated to a host that does support XSAVE without the new host having to handle FPU state that may or may not be compatible with XSAVE. Setting the uABI size to the host's default size results in out-of-bounds writes (setting the FP+SSE bits) and data corruption (that is thankfully caught by KASAN) when running on hosts without XSAVE, e.g. on Core2 CPUs. WARN if the default size is larger than KVM's historical uABI size; all features that can push the FPU size beyond the historical size must be opt-in. ================================================================== BUG: KASAN: slab-out-of-bounds in fpu_copy_uabi_to_guest_fpstate+0x86/0x130 Read of size 8 at addr ffff888011e33a00 by task qemu-build/681 CPU: 1 PID: 681 Comm: qemu-build Not tainted 5.18.0-rc5-KASAN-amd64 #1 Hardware name: /DG35EC, BIOS ECG3510M.86A.0118.2010.0113.1426 01/13/2010 Call Trace: <TASK> dump_stack_lvl+0x34/0x45 print_report.cold+0x45/0x575 kasan_report+0x9b/0xd0 fpu_copy_uabi_to_guest_fpstate+0x86/0x130 kvm_arch_vcpu_ioctl+0x72a/0x1c50 [kvm] kvm_vcpu_ioctl+0x47f/0x7b0 [kvm] __x64_sys_ioctl+0x5de/0xc90 do_syscall_64+0x31/0x50 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x44/0xae </TASK> Allocated by task 0: (stack is not available) The buggy address belongs to the object at ffff888011e33800 which belongs to the cache kmalloc-512 of size 512 The buggy address is located 0 bytes to the right of 512-byte region [ffff888011e33800, ffff888011e33a00) The buggy address belongs to the physical page: page:0000000089cd4adb refcount:1 mapcount:0 mapping:0000000000000000 index:0x0 pfn:0x11e30 head:0000000089cd4adb order:2 compound_mapcount:0 compound_pincount:0 flags: 0x4000000000010200(slab|head|zone=1) raw: 4000000000010200 dead000000000100 dead000000000122 ffff888001041c80 raw: 0000000000000000 0000000080100010 00000001ffffffff 0000000000000000 page dumped because: kasan: bad access detected Memory state around the buggy address: ffff888011e33900: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ffff888011e33980: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 >ffff888011e33a00: fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc ^ ffff888011e33a80: fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc ffff888011e33b00: fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc fc ================================================================== Disabling lock debugging due to kernel taint

Published: 2025-02-26 Last update: 2025-10-22 Assigner: 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67 Source: 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67

Conclusion & alert: CVE-2022-49557 is rated Low Risk (29.6/100): CVSS Medium severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.07%). Mandatory action: Monitor for updates and reassess as exploit intelligence or EPSS changes.

Risk is dynamic; we continuously reassess and refresh what is shown on this page as upstream context changes.

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2022-49557

EPSS lead: Daily EPSS estimates relative likelihood of exploitation; percentile ranks this CVE among scored vulnerabilities (higher = more severe relative rank).

# Date Old EPSS score New EPSS score Delta (New - Old)
1 2026-04-06 0.04% 0.07% +0.03%
2 2025-02-27 0.04%

Full EPSS history (2 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2022-49557

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
5.5 3.1 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:L)
They already need access on the box, or another person has to do something wrong; it’s not a remote drive-by.
Attack complexity (AC:L)
Once they can reach the bug, pulling it off is straightforward—no weird race conditions or rare setup.
Privileges required (PR:L)
A normal user session is enough; they don’t have to be admin.
User interaction (UI:N)
Nobody has to click “OK” or open a trap file; it can work without a victim helping.
Scope (S:U)
Damage stays in the same “trust bubble” as the broken component—no big spill into unrelated systems.
Confidentiality (C:N)
Doesn’t really leak secrets in a meaningful way.
Integrity (I:N)
Data isn’t meaningfully altered or forged.
Availability (A:H)
Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.
1.8 3.6 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2022-49557

OS Trackers for CVE-2022-49557

vendor priority summary link
debian unimportant CVE-2022-49557 unimportant priority: Debian including 1 source packages (linux), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 5. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2022-49557
redhat low https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2022-49557
suse medium CVE-2022-49557 severity moderate: SUSE including 46 source package names (bpftool-4.18.0-372.26.1.el8_6, cluster-md-kmp-default, …), 265 product×package rows across 47 product lines (SLES-LTSS-TERADATA 15 SP2, SUSE Liberty Linux 8, … (47 product lines)): Known Not Affected 245, Fixed 20. https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2022-49557/
ubuntu medium CVE-2022-49557 medium priority: Ubuntu including 158 source packages (linux, linux-allwinner-5.19, …), 1551 status rows across 10 suites (bionic, focal, jammy, noble, oracular, plucky, questing, trusty, upstream, xenial): DNE 1145, not-affected 168, ignored 146, released 92. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2022-49557

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2022-49557

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
linux linux_kernel >= 5.17, < 5.17.13 cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
linux linux_kernel >= 5.18, < 5.18.2 cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2022-49557

cvelogic Threat Intelligence