Microsoft has issued an emergency out-of-band (OOB) update to resolve a critical issue affecting Hyper-V virtual machines running on Windows Server 2022. The update, identified as KB5061906, addresses problems causing VMs to freeze or restart unexpectedly.

## Key Details of the Issue

The problem specifically impacts the direct send path for guest physical addresses (GPA) in confidential virtual machines. These affected VMs would intermittently become unresponsive or restart without warning, disrupting service availability and requiring manual intervention to restore functionality.

Microsoft noted that this issue “primarily affects Azure confidential VMs” – specialized virtual machines designed to protect data during processing, not just during transmission or storage. Standard Hyper-V deployments are generally unaffected except in rare cases involving preview or pre-production configurations.

## Update Implementation

The KB5061906 update supersedes all previous updates for Windows Server 2022. However, administrators should note that:

– The update will not install automatically
– It is not delivered through Windows Update
– It must be manually installed using the standalone MSU package from the Microsoft Update Catalog

For organizations that haven’t yet deployed the May 2025 Windows security update (KB5058385) and are running Hyper-V on Windows Server 2022, Microsoft recommends applying this OOB update instead. Organizations unaffected by the issue do not need to install this update.

## Pattern of Hyper-V Issues

This is not the first emergency update Microsoft has released for Hyper-V-related problems. Last month, the company issued emergency updates for issues preventing Windows containers from launching on Windows Server 2019, 2022, and 2025 systems. Similar problems affecting Hyper-V VMs were also addressed in October 2023 and twice in 2022.