CVE-2026-43288 PUBLISHED

ext4: move ext4_percpu_param_init() before ext4_mb_init()

Assigner: Linux
Reserved: 01.05.2026 Published: 08.05.2026 Updated: 09.05.2026

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

ext4: move ext4_percpu_param_init() before ext4_mb_init()

When running kvm-xfstests -c ext4/1k -C 1 generic/383 with the DOUBLE_CHECK macro defined, the following panic is triggered:

================================================================== EXT4-fs error (device vdc): ext4_validate_block_bitmap:423: comm mount: bg 0: bad block bitmap checksum BUG: unable to handle page fault for address: ff110000fa2cc000 PGD 3e01067 P4D 3e02067 PUD 0 Oops: Oops: 0000 [#1] SMP NOPTI CPU: 0 UID: 0 PID: 2386 Comm: mount Tainted: G W 6.18.0-gba65a4e7120a-dirty #1152 PREEMPT(none) RIP: 0010:percpu_counter_add_batch+0x13/0xa0 Call Trace: <TASK> ext4_mark_group_bitmap_corrupted+0xcb/0xe0 ext4_validate_block_bitmap+0x2a1/0x2f0 ext4_read_block_bitmap+0x33/0x50 mb_group_bb_bitmap_alloc+0x33/0x80 ext4_mb_add_groupinfo+0x190/0x250 ext4_mb_init_backend+0x87/0x290 ext4_mb_init+0x456/0x640 __ext4_fill_super+0x1072/0x1680 ext4_fill_super+0xd3/0x280 get_tree_bdev_flags+0x132/0x1d0 vfs_get_tree+0x29/0xd0 vfs_cmd_create+0x59/0xe0 __do_sys_fsconfig+0x4f6/0x6b0 do_syscall_64+0x50/0x1f0 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x76/0x7e ==================================================================

This issue can be reproduced using the following commands: mkfs.ext4 -F -q -b 1024 /dev/sda 5G tune2fs -O quota,project /dev/sda mount /dev/sda /tmp/test

With DOUBLE_CHECK defined, mb_group_bb_bitmap_alloc() reads and validates the block bitmap. When the validation fails, ext4_mark_group_bitmap_corrupted() attempts to update sbi->s_freeclusters_counter. However, this percpu_counter has not been initialized yet at this point, which leads to the panic described above.

Fix this by moving the execution of ext4_percpu_param_init() to occur before ext4_mb_init(), ensuring the per-CPU counters are initialized before they are used.

Product Status

Vendor Linux
Product Linux
Versions Default: unaffected
  • affected from d5e03cbb0c88cd1be39f2adc37d602230045964b to 0d5fcb063cdabb9aeaa8554b7fedad2092c4150e (excl.)
  • affected from d5e03cbb0c88cd1be39f2adc37d602230045964b to 9e9fb259bcddf459a0168f4a964e979e500a68a5 (excl.)
  • affected from d5e03cbb0c88cd1be39f2adc37d602230045964b to bf5b609524497c195f801cd5707252384aed8149 (excl.)
  • affected from d5e03cbb0c88cd1be39f2adc37d602230045964b to aec095f3cc6cf209effd93278ce35be27db81d73 (excl.)
  • affected from d5e03cbb0c88cd1be39f2adc37d602230045964b to 270564513489d98b721a1e4a10017978d5213bff (excl.)
Vendor Linux
Product Linux
Versions Default: affected
  • Version 3.17 is affected
  • unaffected from 0 to 3.17 (excl.)
  • unaffected from 6.6.128 to 6.6.* (incl.)
  • unaffected from 6.12.75 to 6.12.* (incl.)
  • unaffected from 6.18.16 to 6.18.* (incl.)
  • unaffected from 6.19.6 to 6.19.* (incl.)
  • unaffected from 7.0 to * (incl.)

References