libvirt: Security Process
Description: libvirt, virtualization, virtualization API

# Security Process

The libvirt project handles security disclosures with a lightweight process whose aim is to minimize the overhead of triage and prioritize publication of a patch that addresses the issue.

## Reporting security issues

Security concerns should be reported as confidential issues in the libvirt project on GitLab, or one of the other related projects under the libvirt namespace if the issue does not apply to the core project.

Ensure that the "turn on confidentiality" checkbox is selected prior to submitting the issue, to restrict visibility to project maintainers only.

Important

Only attach plain files, do not bundle files in archives (zip, tar, etc.) without prior request from a libvirt maintainer.

Maintainer(s) will analyse the reported disclosure and decide whether it is to be classed as a security flaw or not. If not a security flaw, the confidential tag will be removed immediately. If a security flaw, the maintainers will work to develop and test a patch. When a suitable patch is considered ready to post to the mailing list or a merge request, the confidential tag will be removed. Generally a CVE should be assigned to a security issue before a patch is ready to be posted (see below).

Note

Refer to the bug reporting page for the expectations around the use of automated tools and AI agents, prior to filing any security report.

## Security notices

Information for all historical security issues is maintained in machine parsable format in the libvirt-security-notice GIT repository and published online in text, HTML and XML formats. Security notices are published on the libvirt-announce mailing list when any embargo is lifted, or as soon as triaged if already public knowledge.

## Publication embargo policy

The libvirt project policy is to limit the time that a disclosure has the "confidential" marker applied strictly to the minimum required to develop and publish a suitable patch and allocate a CVE.

Given the widespread use of AI/LLM based agents for security auditing, as well as ongoing use of traditional fuzzing and static analysis tools, the libvirt maintainers consider that any disclosure originating from automated tools is highly likely to be independently re-discovered, potentially many times over in a very short timeframe.

Thus the libvirt maintainers will generally reject requests for arbitrary embargoes unless high severity, extenuating circumstances can be demonstrated.

If a patch for a confirmed security issue cannot be developed by a maintainer in a reasonable time, the maintainers may choose to make a disclosure public without having a patch available. This approach should only be taken for issues judged to have low severity.

## CVE allocation

If a reported disclosure is confirmed to be a security flaw, the CVE::Required label will be added.

When a CVE has been allocated, this label will be removed and replaced by CVE::Assigned.

The allocated CVE identifier will be included in the patch(es) that are required to fix the issue. If multiple patches are involved, the CVE must be included in the final patch in the series that closes the last hole, but should also be included in any prior patches it the series that are directly related.

## Branch fixing policy

The security team will publish fixes for GIT master (which will become the next major release). The distro maintainers will be responsible for backporting the officially published fixes to other release branches where applicable.