External Secrets Operator: Priviledge escalation with secret overwriting

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Summary

CVECVE-2026-42876
StatePUBLISHED
AssignerGitHub_M
Source PriorityCVE Program / NVD first with legacy fallback
Published2026-05-11 20:25:44 UTC
Updated2026-05-11 20:25:44 UTC
DescriptionExternal Secrets Operator reads information from a third-party service and automatically injects the values as Kubernetes Secrets. Prior to 2.4.1, a user who only has permission to create ExternalSecret resources can cause the operator to create a Secret that Kubernetes will automatically populate with a long-lived token for the specified service account. This effectively allows the user to impersonate any service account in the namespace without needing direct create permissions on TokenRequest or Secrets of that type. This vulnerability is fixed in 2.4.1.

Risk And Classification

Primary CVSS: v3.1 4.9 MEDIUM from [email protected]

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N

EPSS: 0.000200000 probability, percentile 0.058470000 (date 2026-05-12)

Problem Types: CWE-285 | CWE-285 CWE-285: Improper Authorization

VersionSourceTypeScoreSeverityVector
3.1[email protected]Secondary4.9MEDIUMCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N
3.1CNADECLARED4.9MEDIUMCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N

CVSS v3.1 Breakdown

Attack Vector
Network
Attack Complexity
High
Privileges Required
Low
User Interaction
None
Scope
Changed
Confidentiality
Low
Integrity
Low
Availability
None

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N

Vendor Declared Affected Products

SourceVendorProductVersionPlatforms
CNA External-secrets External-secrets affected < 2.4.1 Not specified

References

ReferenceSourceLinkTags
github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/releases/tag/v2.4.1 [email protected] github.com
github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/commit/4ddd240af7fe88725d98... [email protected] github.com
github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/security/advisories/GHSA-fq... [email protected] github.com
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