Container Privilege Escalation Flaw in Multicluster Engine for Kubernetes by Red Hat

CVE-2025-57851

What is CVE-2025-57851?

A container privilege escalation vulnerability exists in specific images of the Multicluster Engine for Kubernetes. The issue arises from the /etc/passwd file being created with group-writable permissions during the build process. If an attacker gains command execution capabilities within an affected container, even as a non-root user, they can exploit their affiliation with the root group to alter the /etc/passwd file. This manipulation can permit the attacker to introduce a new user with any arbitrary UID, including UID 0, thereby granting them full root access to the container.

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