Medium [CVE-2026-72212] fix incorrect altmap passing in error path
This medium-severity Red Hat Linux advisory covers CVE-2026-72212 affecting Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6, Red Hat package: kernel.
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Summary
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: mm/memory_hotplug: fix incorrect altmap passing in error path In create_altmaps_and_memory_blocks(), when arch_add_memory() succeeds with memmap_on_memory enabled, the vmemmap pages are allocated from params.altmap.
If create_memory_block_devices() subsequently fails, the error path calls arch_remove_memory() with a NULL altmap instead of params.altmap. This is a bug that could lead to memory corruption.
Since altmap is NULL, vmemmap_free() falls back to freeing the vmemmap pages into the system buddy allocator via free_pages() instead of the altmap. arch_remove_memory() then immediately destroys the physical linear mapping for this memory.
This injects unowned pages into the buddy allocator, causing machine checks or memory corruption if the system later attempts to allocate and use those freed pages. A flaw was found in the Linux kernel's memory hotplug subsystem.
An error in the memory cleanup process, specifically when memory is added and then an issue occurs during device creation, can lead to incorrect handling of memory pages. This vulnerability can result in memory corruption, potentially causing system instability, crashes, or a Denial of Service (DoS) condition.
Red Hat severity: Moderate — CVSS 5.5 (CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H). Weakness: CWE-825.
Affected versions
No affected-version range was extracted from the source record. The vendor advisory is authoritative — check it before change work.
Official advisory · medium-confidence parse· fetched 24 days ago·verify at source
Fixed versions
No fixed release is recorded yet. That does not prove no patch exists — confirm against the vendor advisory.
Official advisory · medium-confidence parse· fetched 24 days ago·verify at source
Mitigation
The source record does not include mitigation steps. That is not a statement that no fix exists — read the vendor advisory below for the authoritative guidance.
Official advisory · medium-confidence parse· fetched 24 days ago·verify at source
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