CVE-2026-98888

About vulnerability

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

arm64: kprobes: Allow reentering kprobes while single-stepping

A kprobe can be hit while another kprobe is in KPROBE_HIT_SS state. This can happen when tracing or perf code runs from the debug exception path while the first kprobe is preparing or executing its out-of-line single-step instruction.

Currently arm64 treats a kprobe hit in KPROBE_HIT_SS as unrecoverable, the same as a hit in KPROBE_REENTER. This is too strict. A hit in KPROBE_HIT_SS is still a one-level reentry and can be handled by saving the current kprobe state and setting up single-step for the new probe, just like reentry from KPROBE_HIT_ACTIVE or KPROBE_HIT_SSDONE.

The truly unrecoverable case is hitting another kprobe while already in KPROBE_REENTER, because the reentry save area has already been consumed.

Move KPROBE_HIT_SS to the recoverable reentry cases and leave KPROBE_REENTER as the unrecoverable nested reentry case.

This change also requires saving saved_irqflag in struct prev_kprobe. When a nested kprobe calls kprobes_save_local_irqflag(), it overwrites kcb->saved_irqflag with the currently masked DAIF value, losing the outer kprobe’s original DAIF state. Without this fix, when the outer kprobe’s single-step finishes, kprobes_restore_local_irqflag() applies the wrong DAIF mask and leaves interrupts permanently disabled.

Extend struct prev_kprobe with a saved_irqflag field and save/restore it alongside kp and status. This ensures the outer kprobe’s original interrupt state is preserved across reentry.

This mirrors the x86 fix in commit 6a5022a56ac3 (“kprobes/x86: Allow to handle reentered kprobe on single-stepping”).

Affected product:

AlmaLinux 9.2 ESU , Amazon Linux 2 ELS , CentOS 6 ELS , CentOS 7 ELS , CentOS 8.4 ELS , CentOS 8.5 ELS , CentOS Stream 8 ELS , CloudLinux 7 ELS , Debian 10 ELS , Debian 11 ELS , Oracle Linux 6 ELS , Oracle Linux 7 ELS , RHEL 7 ELS , TuxCare 9.6 ESU , TuxCare 9.8 ESU , Ubuntu 16.04 ELS , Ubuntu 18.04 ELS , Ubuntu 20.04 ELS

Affected packages:

linux-hwe @ 4.15.0 (+20 more)

Live-patch status from KernelCare for each operating system.