How severe is CVE-2025-29781?

CVE-2025-29781 has a CVSS score of 6.5/10, rated MEDIUM. Review your exposure and patch according to your risk tolerance.

Which packages are affected by CVE-2025-29781?

CVE-2025-29781 affects the following packages: github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis (Go), github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis (Go). Ecosystems affected: Go.

How do I fix CVE-2025-29781?

Update github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis to 0.9.1 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2025-29781 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.

How do I detect CVE-2025-29781 in my Go dependencies?

Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.

How do I mitigate CVE-2025-29781 if there is no patch (or I can't update yet)?

Assume what was exposed is already known: rotate any credential, token or key that the affected component could return, restrict the endpoint to callers that genuinely need it, and strip sensitive fields from responses and error output at the boundary rather than relying on the client not to read them.

Is CVE-2025-29781 actively exploited in the wild?

No public exploit code has been indexed for CVE-2025-29781 yet. This does not mean the vulnerability cannot be exploited — absence of public exploits does not imply safety. Apply the recommended fix and use O3 Security to monitor your exposure.

What is the EPSS score for CVE-2025-29781?

CVE-2025-29781 has an EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) score of 0.2%, placing it in the 8th percentile of all CVEs. EPSS is maintained by FIRST.org and estimates the probability that a vulnerability will be exploited in the wild within the next 30 days. This score indicates relatively lower exploitation probability, though the CVSS severity should still guide your patching priority.

What type of vulnerability is CVE-2025-29781?

CVE-2025-29781 is classified as Information Exposure (CWE-200), CWE-653 (CWE-653). These weakness types describe the underlying flaw category, which helps determine the potential impact and the right class of mitigation.

When was CVE-2025-29781 published, and has it been updated?

CVE-2025-29781 was published on March 17, 2025 and was last updated on October 28, 2026. Advisory data evolves as severity scores, affected ranges, and exploit intelligence are revised — always check the latest version of the advisory before acting.

🐹

🐹 Go

Not in CISA KEV

MEDIUM severity

CVE-2025-29781 — apis

MEDIUMFix: metal3-io/baremetal-operator@19f8443

CVE-2025-29781 is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.5) Information Exposure vulnerability in github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis. A fix is available for github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis — see the affected versions and patch details below.

Bare Metal Operator (BMO) can expose any secret from other namespaces via BMCEventSubscription CRD

Also known asGHSA-c98h-7hp9-v9hqGO-2025-3530

Published

Mar 17, 2025

Updated

Oct 28, 2026

Affected

2 pkgs

Patched

2 / 2

Exploits

None indexed

Exploitation data as of Oct 29, 2026 · OSV.dev, NVD, FIRST.org (EPSS)

Exploitation Status

Proof-of-concept exploit code exists

CISA’s SSVC triage found public proof-of-concept exploit code for this CVE, though no confirmed active exploitation.

Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for CVE-2025-29781.

EPSS Exploitation Probability

via FIRST.org ↗

0.2%probability of exploitation in next 30 days

Lower Risk+0.00%

Lower risk than most CVEs8th percentile — riskier than 8% of all scored CVEsHighest risk

Probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, from FIRST.org EPSS.

How urgent is this, really

Where this sits among everything scored

Real-World Exposure

2 pkgs affected

🐹github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis🐹github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis

Real-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

Impact

The Bare Metal Operator (BMO) implements a Kubernetes API for managing bare metal hosts in Metal3.

Baremetal Operator enables users to load Secret from arbitrary namespaces upon deployment of the namespace scoped Custom Resource BMCEventSubscription (BMCES). An adversary Kubernetes account with only namespace level roles (e.g. a tenant controlling a namespace) may create a BMCES in their authorized namespace and then load Secrets from their unauthorized namespaces to their authorized namespace via the Baremetal Operator controller's cluster scoped privileges, causing Secret leakage.

Patches

The patch makes BMO refuse to read Secrets from other namespace than where the corresponding Bare Metal Host (BMH) resource is. The patch does not change the BMCEventSubscription API in BMO, but stricter validation will deny the request at admission time. It will also prevent the controller reading such Secrets, in case the BMCES resource has already been deployed.

The issue exists for all versions of BMO, and is patched in BMO releases v0.9.1 and v0.8.1. Prior upgrading to patched BMO version, duplicate any existing Secret pointed to by BMCEventSubscription's httpHeadersRef to the same namespace where the corresponding BMH exists. After upgrade, remove the old Secrets.

Workarounds

Operator can configure BMO RBAC to be namespace scoped, instead of cluster scoped, to prevent BMO from accessing Secrets from other namespaces, and/or use WATCH_NAMESPACE configuration option to limit BMO to single namespace.

References

Credits

Metal3 Security Team thanks WHALEEYE and debuggerchen of Lab for Internet and Security Technology for responsible vulnerability disclosure.

Affected Packages

2 total 2 fixed

Ecosystem	Package	Vulnerable range	Fix
🐹Go	`github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis`	≥ 0.9.0&&< 0.9.1	0.9.1`go get github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis@v0.9.1`
🐹Go	`github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis`	all versions	0.8.1`go get github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis@v0.8.1`

Detection & mitigation playbook

Open-source dependency

Detect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update github.com/metal3-io/baremetal-operator/apis to 0.9.1 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2025-29781 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
Assume what was exposed is already known: rotate any credential, token or key that the affected component could return, restrict the endpoint to callers that genuinely need it, and strip sensitive fields from responses and error output at the boundary rather than relying on the client not to read them.

Fixing This On Your OS

If you run this on a Linux distribution, patch through your package manager against the distro's own security advisory below — it tracks the exact backported fix for your release, which can ship on a different timeline (and sometimes a different severity) than the upstream project.

Red HatImportant

This vulnerability is rated as Important for OpenShift Baremetal Operator, because RBAC is cluster-scoped and, while WATCH_NAMESPACE is set to openshift-machine-api by default, it is common for deployments to have a less restrictive value configured. It breaks Kubernetes' namespace isolation by allowing a user to…

Workaround published by Red Hat

Operator can configure BMO role-based access control (RBAC) to be namespace scoped instead of cluster scoped to prevent BMO from accessing Secrets from other namespaces, or use the `WATCH_NAMESPACE` configuration option to limit BMO to a single namespace.

Source: Red Hat security advisory for CVE-2025-29781 (CC BY 4.0)

Product	Fixed in	Advisory
Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.12	`openshift4/ose-baremetal-rhel8-operator:v4.12.0-202504241000.p0.g6817f4e.assembly.stream.el8`	RHSA-2025:4409
Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.13	`openshift4/ose-baremetal-rhel8-operator:v4.13.0-202504231429.p0.g3f56e49.assembly.stream.el8`	RHSA-2025:4677
Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.14	`openshift4/ose-baremetal-rhel8-operator:v4.14.0-202504220036.p0.g483d019.assembly.stream.el8`	RHSA-2025:4177
Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.15	`openshift4/ose-baremetal-rhel9-operator:v4.15.0-202504281408.p0.g880ee05.assembly.stream.el9`	RHSA-2025:4422
Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.16	`openshift4/ose-baremetal-rhel9-operator:v4.16.0-202504120704.p0.g84aeac3.assembly.stream.el9`	RHSA-2025:4008
Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.17	`openshift4/ose-baremetal-rhel9-operator:v4.17.0-202504091537.p0.ge6e5d54.assembly.stream.el9`	RHSA-2025:3798
Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.18	`openshift4/ose-baremetal-rhel9-operator:v4.18.0-202504090803.p0.g001d949.assembly.stream.el9`	RHSA-2025:3775
Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.19	`openshift4/ose-cluster-baremetal-operator-rhel9:v4.19.0-202505200051.p0.gf64a5c1.assembly.stream.el9`	RHSA-2024:11038

Frequently Asked Questions

### Impact The Bare Metal Operator (BMO) implements a Kubernetes API for managing bare metal hosts in Metal3. Baremetal Operator enables users to load Secret from arbitrary namespaces upon deployment of the namespace scoped Custom Resource `BMCEventSubscription` (BMCES). An adversary Kubernetes account with only namespace level roles (e.g. a tenant controlling a namespace) may create a BMCES in their authorized namespace and then load Secrets from their unauthorized namespaces to their authorized namespace via the Baremetal Operator controller's cluster scoped privileges, causing Secret lea