CVE-2026-72016 — cpu/hotplug: Fix NULL kobject warning in cpuhp_smt_enable()

Affected: Linux

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

cpu/hotplug: Fix NULL kobject warning in cpuhp_smt_enable()

On arm64, when booting with `maxcpus` greater than the number of present CPUs (e.g., QEMU -smp cpus=4,maxcpus=8), some CPUs are marked as 'present' but have not yet been registered via register_cpu(). Consequently, the per-cpu device objects for these CPUs are not yet initialized.

In cpuhp_smt_enable(), the code iterates over all present CPUs. Calling _cpu_up() for these unregistered CPUs eventually leads to sysfs_create_group() being called with a NULL kobject (or a kobject without a directory), triggering the following warning in fs/sysfs/group.c:

WARNING: fs/sysfs/group.c:137 at internal_create_group+0x41c/0x4bc, CPU#2: sh/181 [...] Call trace: internal_create_group+0x41c/0x4bc (P) sysfs_create_group+0x18/0x24 topology_add_dev+0x1c/0x28 cpuhp_invoke_callback+0x104/0x20c __cpuhp_invoke_callback_range+0x94/0x11c _cpu_up+0x200/0x37c

When booting with ACPI, arm64 smp_prepare_cpus() currently sets all enumerated CPUs as "present" regardless of their status in the MADT. This causes issues with SMT hotplug control. For instance, with QEMU's "-smp 4,maxcpus=8" configuration, the MADT GICC entries are populated as follows:

1. The first four CPUs: `Enabled` set but `Online Capable` not set.

2. The remaining four CPUs: `Online Capable` set but `Enabled` not set to support potential hot-plugging.

Fix this by:

1. When…

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CVE-2026-72016 — cpu/hotplug: Fix NULL kobject warning in cpuhp_smt_enable()