CVE-2025-1974
CRITICALingress-nginx admission controller RCE escalation
EPSS Exploitation Probability
EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) is a daily probability model maintained by FIRST.org. It estimates the likelihood a CVE will be exploited in production environments within the next 30 days, derived from real-world threat intelligence signals.
Blast Radius
k8s.io/ingress-nginx🐹k8s.io/ingress-nginxReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Go packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
A security issue was discovered in Kubernetes where under certain conditions, an unauthenticated attacker with access to the pod network can achieve arbitrary code execution in the context of the ingress-nginx controller. This can lead to disclosure of Secrets accessible to the controller. (Note that in the default installation, the controller can access all Secrets cluster-wide.)
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐹Go | k8s.io/ingress-nginx | all versions | 1.11.5 |
| 🐹Go | k8s.io/ingress-nginx | ≥ 1.12.0-beta.0&&< 1.12.1 | 1.12.1 |
Research use only. For defensive security, authorized penetration testing, and academic research only. Never execute exploit code against systems without explicit written authorization.
Ingress-NGINX 4.11.0 - Remote Code Execution (RCE)
by Likhith Appalaneni · Jun 20, 2025
Ingress-NGINX Admission Controller v1.11.1 - FD Injection to RCE
by Beatriz Fresno Naumova · Feb 4, 2026
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for k8s.io/ingress-nginx. O3's reachability analysis confirms whether the vulnerable code path is actually invoked in your application, so you act on real exposure instead of every transitive match.
Fix
Update k8s.io/ingress-nginx to 1.11.5 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2025-1974 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
If you can't upgrade right away: gate or disable the affected feature, validate untrusted input at the boundary, and avoid passing attacker-controlled data into the vulnerable path. O3's runtime protection blocks exploitation in production as an interim safeguard until the upgrade lands.
How O3 protects you
O3 pinpoints whether CVE-2025-1974 is reachable in your code and exactly where to fix it, then blocks exploitation in production at runtime until the patched version is deployed.
Tailored to CVE-2025-1974. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2025-1974 in your dependencies?
O3 detects CVE-2025-1974 across Go dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.