Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2018-7540

medium Nessus Plugin ID 221914

Synopsis

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed with a vulnerability that the vendor indicates will not be patched.

Description

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed that are impacted by a vulnerability without a vendor supplied patch available.

- An issue was discovered in Xen through 4.10.x allowing x86 PV guest OS users to cause a denial of service (host OS CPU hang) via non-preemptable L3/L4 pagetable freeing. (CVE-2018-7540)

Note that Nessus relies on the presence of the package as reported by the vendor.

Solution

There is no known solution at this time.

See Also

https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/cve-2018-7540

https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2018-7540

Plugin Details

Severity: Medium

ID: 221914

File Name: unpatched_CVE_2018_7540.nasl

Version: 1.2

Type: local

Agent: unix

Family: Misc.

Published: 3/4/2025

Updated: 8/27/2025

Supported Sensors: Agentless Assessment, Frictionless Assessment Agent, Frictionless Assessment AWS, Frictionless Assessment Azure, Nessus Agent, Nessus

Risk Information

VPR

Risk Factor: Medium

Score: 4.4

CVSS v2

Risk Factor: Medium

Base Score: 4.9

Temporal Score: 3.6

Vector: CVSS2#AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:C

CVSS Score Source: CVE-2018-7540

CVSS v3

Risk Factor: Medium

Base Score: 6.5

Temporal Score: 5.7

Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:N/A:H

Temporal Vector: CVSS:3.0/E:U/RL:O/RC:C

Vulnerability Information

CPE: cpe:/o:redhat:enterprise_linux:5, cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:16.04:-:lts, p-cpe:/a:canonical:ubuntu_linux:xen, p-cpe:/a:redhat:enterprise_linux:xen

Required KB Items: Host/OS/identifier, Host/cpu, Host/local_checks_enabled, global_settings/vendor_unpatched

Exploit Ease: No known exploits are available

Vulnerability Publication Date: 2/27/2018

Reference Information

CVE: CVE-2018-7540