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🛡️ CVE-2021-28704 on Ubuntu — xen

⚪ Unknown ✅ No Known Exploit OSV
N/A
CVSS Score
0 Low4 Medium7 High9 Critical10

Description

PoD operations on misaligned GFNs T[his CNA information record relates to multiple CVEs; the text explains which aspects/vulnerabilities correspond to which CVE.] x86 HVM and PVH guests may be started in populate-on-demand (PoD) mode, to provide a way for them to later easily have more memory assigned. Guests are permitted to control certain P2M aspects of individual pages via hypercalls. These hypercalls may act on ranges of pages specified via page orders (resulting in a power-of-2 number of pages). The implementation of some of these hypercalls for PoD does not enforce the base page frame number to be suitably aligned for the specified order, yet some code involved in PoD handling actually makes such an assumption. These operations are XENMEM_decrease_reservation (CVE-2021-28704) and XENMEM_populate_physmap (CVE-2021-28707), the latter usable only by domains controlling the guest, i.e. a de-privileged qemu or a stub domain. (Patch 1, combining the fix to both these two issues.) In addition handling of XENMEM_decrease_reservation can also trigger a host crash when the specified page order is neither 4k nor 2M nor 1G (CVE-2021-28708, patch 2).

Distribution advisory

This page covers CVE-2021-28704 as tracked by Ubuntu, for the package xen. No fixed version has been recorded for this distribution yet.

How this vulnerability can be exploited

This issue can be reached with local access to the system, attack complexity is low, an attacker needs low-level privileges on the target. No user interaction is required. The scope is changed, meaning a successful attack can affect components beyond the vulnerable one. Rated impact: confidentiality high, integrity high, availability high.

CVSS metrics in full

The score comes from this vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H

  • Attack vector: Local — a local account, shell or session on the host is needed.
  • Attack complexity: Low — the attack works reliably, with no preparation.
  • Privileges required: Low — an ordinary user account is enough.
  • User interaction: None — nobody has to be tricked into anything.
  • Scope: Changed — a successful attack reaches components beyond the vulnerable one.
  • Confidentiality impact: High — total loss, or loss the attacker controls.
  • Integrity impact: High — total loss, or loss the attacker controls.
  • Availability impact: High — total loss, or loss the attacker controls.

Affected software

UBUNTU-CVE-2021-28704 is recorded against 1 package.

  • xen

Timeline and source

Published on 24 November 2021 and last revised on 20 May 2026. No public exploit is currently recorded for this entry. Record sourced from OSV.

References

ubuntu.com (Report)
xenbits.xen.org (Report)
www.cve.org (Report)

Other advisories for this package

xen has other advisories on record. If you are patching this one, these are worth checking on the same host:

CVE-2021-28704 on other distributions

Each distribution ships its own build and its own fixed version. Pick the one you run:

Details

Severity Unknown
CVSS Score N/A
CVSS Vector CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H
CWE N/A
Public Exploit ✅ No
Source OSV
Published 2021-11-24
Updated 2026-08-20
Modified 2026-05-20
Fix URL N/A

Affected Packages

Software From version Fixed in
xen — —

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ⓘ Data Notice: The information presented above has been compiled from publicly available internet sources. Boteraser aggregates this data solely for informational purposes and does not independently classify, evaluate, or endorse any findings about the vulnerabilities listed. The accuracy and completeness of this information is the sole responsibility of the original publishers. Boteraser and its operators accept no liability for any decisions made based on this data.

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