NULL Pointer Dereference Affecting perf6.18-debuginfo package, versions <1:6.18.20-20.229.amzn2023


Severity

Recommended
high

Based on Amazon Linux security rating.

Threat Intelligence

EPSS
0.12% (3rd percentile)

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  • Snyk IDSNYK-AMZN2023-PERF618DEBUGINFO-16350117
  • published3 May 2026
  • disclosed3 Apr 2026

Introduced: 3 Apr 2026

CVE-2026-31397  (opens in a new tab)
CWE-476  (opens in a new tab)

How to fix?

Upgrade Amazon-Linux:2023 perf6.18-debuginfo to version 1:6.18.20-20.229.amzn2023 or higher.
This issue was patched in ALAS2023-2026-1596.

NVD Description

Note: Versions mentioned in the description apply only to the upstream perf6.18-debuginfo package and not the perf6.18-debuginfo package as distributed by Amazon-Linux. See How to fix? for Amazon-Linux:2023 relevant fixed versions and status.

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

mm/huge_memory: fix use of NULL folio in move_pages_huge_pmd()

move_pages_huge_pmd() handles UFFDIO_MOVE for both normal THPs and huge zero pages. For the huge zero page path, src_folio is explicitly set to NULL, and is used as a sentinel to skip folio operations like lock and rmap.

In the huge zero page branch, src_folio is NULL, so folio_mk_pmd(NULL, pgprot) passes NULL through folio_pfn() and page_to_pfn(). With SPARSEMEM_VMEMMAP this silently produces a bogus PFN, installing a PMD pointing to non-existent physical memory. On other memory models it is a NULL dereference.

Use page_folio(src_page) to obtain the valid huge zero folio from the page, which was obtained from pmd_page() and remains valid throughout.

After commit d82d09e48219 ("mm/huge_memory: mark PMD mappings of the huge zero folio special"), moved huge zero PMDs must remain special so vm_normal_page_pmd() continues to treat them as special mappings.

move_pages_huge_pmd() currently reconstructs the destination PMD in the huge zero page branch, which drops PMD state such as pmd_special() on architectures with CONFIG_ARCH_HAS_PTE_SPECIAL. As a result, vm_normal_page_pmd() can treat the moved huge zero PMD as a normal page and corrupt its refcount.

Instead of reconstructing the PMD from the folio, derive the destination entry from src_pmdval after pmdp_huge_clear_flush(), then handle the PMD metadata the same way move_huge_pmd() does for moved entries by marking it soft-dirty and clearing uffd-wp.