GHSA-hx8w-ghh8-r4xf — rancher
HIGHGHSA-hx8w-ghh8-r4xf is a high-severity (CVSS 8.1) Improper Privilege Management vulnerability in github.com/rancher/rancher. A fix is available for github.com/rancher/rancher — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Write access to the catalog for any user when restricted-admin role is enabled in Rancher
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.
How urgent is this, really
GHSA-hx8w-ghh8-r4xf plotted by exploitation likelihood (EPSS) against impact (CVSS). The shaded corner — EPSS 50%+ and CVSS 7.0+ — is where this CVE doesn't sit, though severity or exploitability alone can still warrant action.
Where this sits among everything scored
Of 377,166 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the < 10% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.
Real-World Exposure
github.com/rancher/rancher🐹github.com/rancher/rancherReal-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
This vulnerability only affects customers using the restricted-admin role in Rancher. For this role to be active, Rancher must be bootstrapped with the environment variable CATTLE_RESTRICTED_DEFAULT_ADMIN=true or the configuration flag restrictedAdmin=true.
A flaw was discovered in Rancher versions from 2.5.0 up to and including 2.5.12 and from 2.6.0 up to and including 2.6.3 where the global-data role in cattle-global-data namespace grants write access to the Catalogs. Since each user with any level of catalog access was bound to the global-data role, this grants write access to templates (CatalogTemplates) and template versions (CatalogTemplateVersions) for any user with any level of catalog access. New users created in Rancher are by default assigned to the user role (standard user), which is not designed to grant write catalog access. This vulnerability effectively elevates the privilege of any user to write access for the catalog template and catalog template version resources.
A malicious user could abuse this vulnerability to:
- Make applications or individual versions of applications visible or hidden on the UI, by modifying
versionandrancherMaxVersionfields. - Change the logo (field
icon) of an application or template to an arbitrary image. - Make a chart appear as a trusted or partner chart. This can be abused to make less trusted charts, such as customer defined charts, appear more legitimate than they are, by adding the label
io.rancher.certified: partner. - Swap template versions between templates of charts inside the same catalog. This can be exploited to swap the files from one chart or version to another, by changing
versionDirfield. When a user on the target cluster deploys their chart, it will deploy the modified version.
This vulnerability does not allow to modify the base64 encoded files fields of the templateVersions, so one cannot inject arbitrary data to charts that have already been pulled from their respective catalog.
Without access to the Catalog, malicious users are limited to injecting apps which already exist in a registered catalog. They would need write access to the catalog or external write access to a source repo to inject arbitrary code.
Patches
Patched versions include releases 2.5.13, 2.6.4 and later versions.
Workarounds
Limit access in Rancher to trusted users. There is not a direct mitigation besides upgrading to the patched Rancher versions.
Note: If you use the restricted-admin as the default admin role in your environment, it's highly advised to review CatalogTemplates and CatalogTemplateVersions for possible malicious modifications.
For more information
If you have any questions or comments about this advisory:
- Reach out to SUSE Rancher Security team for security related inquiries.
- Open an issue in Rancher repository.
- Verify our support matrix and product support lifecycle.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐹Go | github.com/rancher/rancher | ≥ 2.6.0&&< 2.6.4 | 2.6.4go get github.com/rancher/rancher@v2.6.4 |
| 🐹Go | github.com/rancher/rancher | ≥ 2.5.0&&< 2.5.13 | 2.5.13go get github.com/rancher/rancher@v2.5.13 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for github.com/rancher/rancher, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update github.com/rancher/rancher to 2.6.4 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-hx8w-ghh8-r4xf 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 Security's impact-aware SCA analyses which vulnerable code paths your application actually calls, so a match like GHSA-hx8w-ghh8-r4xf can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-hx8w-ghh8-r4xf. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is GHSA-hx8w-ghh8-r4xf in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-hx8w-ghh8-r4xf across Go dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.