GHSA-r2pg-r6h7-crf3 is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.5) Information Exposure vulnerability in github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets. A fix is available for github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets — see the affected versions and patch details below.
External Secrets Operator has DNS-based secret exfiltration via getHostByName in External Secrets v2 template engine
Exploitation Status
No confirmed exploitation observed yet
- CISA’s own triage has not observed active exploitation or public proof-of-concept code for this CVE as of its last assessment.
Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for GHSA-r2pg-r6h7-crf3.
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-r2pg-r6h7-crf3 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 378,567 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/external-secrets/external-secrets🐹github.com/external-secrets/external-secretsReal-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
External Secrets Operator reads information from a third-party service and automatically injects the values as Kubernetes Secrets. Versions 2.2.0 and below contain a vulnerability in runtime/template/v2/template.go where the v2 template engine removes env and expandenv from Sprig's TxtFuncMap() but leaves the getHostByName function accessible to user-controlled templates. Since ESO executes templates within the controller process, an attacker who can create or update templated ExternalSecret resources can invoke controller-side DNS lookups using secret-derived values. This creates a DNS exfiltration primitive, allowing fetched secret material to be leaked via DNS queries without requiring direct outbound network access from the attacker's workload. The impact is a confidentiality issue, particularly in environments where untrusted or lower-trust users can author templated ExternalSecret resources and the controller has DNS resolution capability. This issue has been fixed in version 2.3.0.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐹Go | github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets | all versions | 1.3.3-0.20260331202714-6800989bdc12go get github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets@v1.3.3-0.20260331202714-6800989bdc12 |
| 🐹Go | github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets | ≥ 2.0.0 | No fix |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets to 1.3.3-0.20260331202714-6800989bdc12 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-r2pg-r6h7-crf3 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-r2pg-r6h7-crf3 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-r2pg-r6h7-crf3. 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-r2pg-r6h7-crf3 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-r2pg-r6h7-crf3 across Go dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.