GHSA-pfhr-pccp-hwmh
MEDIUMNetwork Policies & (Clusterwide) Cilium Network Policies with namespace label selectors may unexpectedly select pods with maliciously crafted labels
Blast Radius
github.com/cilium/cilium🐹github.com/cilium/cilium🐹github.com/cilium/ciliumReal-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
If a user has Network Policies with namespace selectors selecting labels of namespaces, or (clusterwide) Cilium Network Policies matching on namespace labels, then it is possible for an attacker with Kubernetes pod deploy rights (either directly or indirectly via higher-level APIs such as Deployment, Daemonset etc) to craft additional pod labels such that the pod is selected by another policy that exists rather than the expected policy.
Patches
The problem has been fixed and is available on versions >=1.10.14, >=1.11.8, >=1.12.1
Workarounds
There are no workarounds available.
Acknowledgements
The Cilium community has worked together with members of Isovalent to prepare these mitigations. Special thanks to Sander Mathijssen for not only highlighting the issue but also proposing a resolution.
For more information
If you have any questions or comments about this advisory, please reach out on Slack.
As usual, if you think you found a related vulnerability, we strongly encourage you to report security vulnerabilities to our private security mailing list: [email protected] - first, before disclosing them in any public forums. This is a private mailing list where only members of the Cilium internal security team are subscribed to, and is treated as top priority.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐹Go | github.com/cilium/cilium | all versions | 1.10.14 |
| 🐹Go | github.com/cilium/cilium | ≥ 1.11.0&&< 1.11.8 | 1.11.8 |
| 🐹Go | github.com/cilium/cilium | ≥ 1.12.0&&< 1.12.1 | 1.12.1 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for github.com/cilium/cilium. 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 github.com/cilium/cilium to 1.10.14 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-pfhr-pccp-hwmh 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 GHSA-pfhr-pccp-hwmh 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 GHSA-pfhr-pccp-hwmh. 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-pfhr-pccp-hwmh in your dependencies?
O3 detects GHSA-pfhr-pccp-hwmh across Go dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.