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Fencer Vulns
medium 4.9

CVE-2018-12904 json

In arch/x86/kvm/vmx.c in the Linux kernel before 4.17.2, when nested virtualization is used, local attackers could cause L1 KVM guests to V…

published 2018-06-27 8 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2018-4857

cvss
4.9
version 3.0, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
1.1%
EPSS 1.1% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 66%
public exploits
1
Exploit-DB

Summary

In arch/x86/kvm/vmx.c in the Linux kernel before 4.17.2, when nested virtualization is used, local attackers could cause L1 KVM guests to VMEXIT, potentially allowing privilege escalations and denial of service attacks due to lack of checking of CPL.

Patch / fix

  • linux linux_kernel 4.17.2
  • linux Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 4.16.16-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2018-12904

  • linux Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-33.36
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-1020.20
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 16.04 LTS 4.15.0-1018.19~16.04.2
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-1018.19
  • linux-hwe Ubuntu 16.04 LTS 4.15.0-33.36~16.04.1
  • linux-kvm Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-1020.20
  • linux-oem Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-1017.20
  • linux-azure Ubuntu 16.04 LTS 4.15.0-1022.22~16.04.1

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2018-12904

Ubuntu security data © Canonical Ltd., from https://github.com/canonical/ubuntu-security-notices via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

  • kernel-livepatch-SLE15_Update_0 SLE Live Patching 15 2-4.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2018:2474-1

Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2018-12904 updated cvss 7.8

kernel: kvm: nVMX: missing privilege check allows privilege escalation in nested virtualization

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 kernel Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 perf, kernel, python-perf, kernel-kdump, kernel-firmware, kernel-bootwrapper, +1 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, kernel-alt, python-perf, +9 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-core, kernel-tools, python3-perf, +17 more Red Hat Enterprise MRG 2 kernel-rt, mrg-rt-release, kernel-rt-trace, kernel-rt-vanilla, kernel-rt-firmware
    not affected: vulnerable code not present

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

Timeline

  1. First public exploit (EDB-44944)
  2. Published

Exploit prediction

1.14% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 66% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

Exploits and checks

  • EDB-44944 KVM (Nested Virtualization) - L1 Guest Privilege Escalation dos, 2018-06-25
  • bugs.chromium.org https://bugs.chromium.org/p/project-zero/issues/detail?id=1589 referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.0 4.9 CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:L
NVD 2.0 4.4 AV:L/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P

Classification

Technology feeds

References

Sources

Fencer Vulns keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.