[PATCH v3 1/4] KVM: VMX: Flush CPU buffers as needed if L1D cache flush is skipped

Sean Christopherson
2025-10-16T20:04:23Z

If the L1D flush for L1TF is conditionally enabled, flush CPU buffers to
mitigate MMIO Stale Data as needed if KVM skips the L1D flush, e.g.
because none of the "heavy" paths that trigger an L1D flush were tripped
since the last VM-Enter.

Note, the flaw goes back to the introduction of the MDS mitigation. The
MDS mitigation was inadvertently fixed by commit 43fb862de8f6 ("KVM/VMX:
Move VERW closer to VMentry for MDS mitigation"), but previous kernels
that flush CPU buffers in vmx_vcpu_enter_exit() are affected.

Fixes: 650b68a0622f ("x86/kvm/vmx: Add MDS protection when L1D Flush is not active")
Cc: Pawan Gupta <pawan.kumar.gupta@linux.intel.com>
Signed-off-by: Sean Christopherson <seanjc@google.com>
---
arch/x86/kvm/vmx/vmx.c | 12 +++++++-----
1 file changed, 7 insertions(+), 5 deletions(-)

diff --git a/arch/x86/kvm/vmx/vmx.c b/arch/x86/kvm/vmx/vmx.c
index f87c216d976d..ce556d5dc39b 100644
--- a/arch/x86/kvm/vmx/vmx.c
+++ b/arch/x86/kvm/vmx/vmx.c
@@ -6663,7 +6663,7 @@ int vmx_handle_exit(struct kvm_vcpu *vcpu, fastpath_t exit_fastpath)
* information but as all relevant affected CPUs have 32KiB L1D cache size
* there is no point in doing so.
*/
-static noinstr void vmx_l1d_flush(struct kvm_vcpu *vcpu)
+static noinstr bool vmx_l1d_flush(struct kvm_vcpu *vcpu)
{
int size = PAGE_SIZE << L1D_CACHE_ORDER;

@@ -6691,14 +6691,14 @@ static noinstr void vmx_l1d_flush(struct kvm_vcpu *vcpu)
kvm_clear_cpu_l1tf_flush_l1d();

if (!flush_l1d)
- return;
+ return false;
}

vcpu->stat.l1d_flush++;

if (static_cpu_has(X86_FEATURE_FLUSH_L1D)) {
native_wrmsrq(MSR_IA32_FLUSH_CMD, L1D_FLUSH);
- return;
+ return true;
}

asm volatile(
@@ -6722,6 +6722,7 @@ static noinstr void vmx_l1d_flush(struct kvm_vcpu *vcpu)
:: [flush_pages] "r" (vmx_l1d_flush_pages),
[size] "r" (size)
: "eax", "ebx", "ecx", "edx");
+ return true;
}

void vmx_update_cr8_intercept(struct kvm_vcpu *vcpu, int tpr, int irr)
@@ -7330,8 +7331,9 @@ static noinstr void vmx_vcpu_enter_exit(struct kvm_vcpu *vcpu,
* and is affected by MMIO Stale Data. In such cases mitigation in only
* needed against an MMIO capable guest.
*/
- if (static_branch_unlikely(&vmx_l1d_should_flush))
- vmx_l1d_flush(vcpu);
+ if (static_branch_unlikely(&vmx_l1d_should_flush) &&
+ vmx_l1d_flush(vcpu))
+ ;
else if (static_branch_unlikely(&cpu_buf_vm_clear) &&
(flags & VMX_RUN_CLEAR_CPU_BUFFERS_FOR_MMIO))
x86_clear_cpu_buffers();
--
2.51.0.858.gf9c4a03a3a-goog