diff --git a/src/platform/nm-linux-platform.c b/src/platform/nm-linux-platform.c
index 89a8db22de..700f1e5d7e 100644
--- a/src/platform/nm-linux-platform.c
+++ b/src/platform/nm-linux-platform.c
@@ -49,6 +49,7 @@
 #include "nm-platform-utils.h"
 #include "wifi/wifi-utils.h"
 #include "wifi/wifi-utils-wext.h"
+#include "nm-utils/unaligned.h"
 
 #define offset_plus_sizeof(t,m) (offsetof (t,m) + sizeof (((t *) NULL)->m))
 
@@ -1472,12 +1473,18 @@ _new_from_nl_link (NMPlatform *platform, const NMPCache *cache, struct nlmsghdr
 	}
 
 	if (tb[IFLA_STATS64]) {
-		struct rtnl_link_stats64 *stats = nla_data (tb[IFLA_STATS64]);
+		/* tb[IFLA_STATS64] is only guaranteed to be 32bit-aligned,
+		 * so in general we can't access the rtnl_link_stats64 struct
+		 * members directly on 64bit architectures. */
+		char *stats = nla_data (tb[IFLA_STATS64]);
 
-		obj->link.rx_packets = stats->rx_packets;
-		obj->link.rx_bytes = stats->rx_bytes;
-		obj->link.tx_packets = stats->tx_packets;
-		obj->link.tx_bytes = stats->tx_bytes;
+#define READ_STAT64(member) \
+	unaligned_read_ne64 (stats + offsetof (struct rtnl_link_stats64, member))
+
+		obj->link.rx_packets = READ_STAT64 (rx_packets);
+		obj->link.rx_bytes   = READ_STAT64 (rx_bytes);
+		obj->link.tx_packets = READ_STAT64 (tx_packets);
+		obj->link.tx_bytes   = READ_STAT64 (tx_bytes);
 	}
 
 	obj->link.n_ifi_flags = ifi->ifi_flags;