CVE-2024-43803

BMO can expose particularly named secrets from other namespaces via BMH CRD

MEDIUM
4.9
CVSS Score
Published: September 3, 2024 at 06:56 PM UTC
Updated: June 17, 2026 at 07:51 AM UTC
1 product affected across 1 vendorBaremetal Operator

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Severity
MEDIUM4.9
Exploit prediction
EPSS 0.6%
SSVC
No known exploit

Description

The Bare Metal Operator (BMO) implements a Kubernetes API for managing bare metal hosts in Metal3. The `BareMetalHost` (BMH) CRD allows the `userData`, `metaData`, and `networkData` for the provisioned host to be specified as links to Kubernetes Secrets. There are fields for both the `Name` and `Namespace` of the Secret, meaning that versions of the baremetal-operator prior to 0.8.0, 0.6.2, and 0.5.2 will read a `Secret` from any namespace. A user with access to create or edit a `BareMetalHost` can thus exfiltrate a `Secret` from another namespace by using it as e.g. the `userData` for provisioning some host (note that this need not be a real host, it could be a VM somewhere). BMO will only read a key with the name `value` (or `userData`, `metaData`, or `networkData`), so that limits the exposure somewhat. `value` is probably a pretty common key though. Secrets used by _other_ `BareMetalHost`s in different namespaces are always vulnerable. It is probably relatively unusual for anyone other than cluster administrators to have RBAC access to create/edit a `BareMetalHost`. This vulnerability is only meaningful, if the cluster has users other than administrators and users' privileges are limited to their respective namespaces. The patch prevents BMO from accepting links to Secrets from other namespaces as BMH input. Any BMH configuration is only read from the same namespace only. The problem is patched in BMO releases v0.7.0, v0.6.2 and v0.5.2 and users should upgrade to those versions. Prior upgrading, duplicate the BMC Secrets to the namespace where the corresponding BMH is. After upgrade, remove the old Secrets. As a workaround, an operator can configure BMO RBAC to be namespace scoped for Secrets, instead of cluster scoped, to prevent BMO from accessing Secrets from other namespaces.

Affected

Our own answer: ranges merged, affected separated from platform-only, with confidence and review flags.

v < 0.5.2v < 0.6.2v < 0.8.0
Affected range stops below 0.5.2, so it looks safe — our inference, not a vendor statement
Affected range stops below 0.6.2, so it looks safe — our inference, not a vendor statement
Affected range stops below 0.8.0, so it looks safe — our inference, not a vendor statement

Remediation

No guide yet

No remediation guidance has been written for this CVE yet, and no fixed version or vendor advisory is recorded against it.

SSVC — Action Prioritization

SSVCNo known exploitNot automatablePartial impact

SSVC signals action urgency (what to patch first), separate from CVSS which measures severity.

CVSS

4.9MEDIUMGitHub_M
Attack Vector
NETWORK
Complexity
LOW
Privileges
HIGH
User Interaction
NONE
Scope
UNCHANGED
Confidentiality
HIGH
Integrity
NONE
Availability
NONE
Vector?

Quick Info

StatusDEFERRED
CWE
CWE-200CWE-653

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