Environment Variable Injection Flaw in CRI-O by Red Hat
CVE-2026-15809

7.8HIGH

Key Information:

Vendor

Red Hat
Status
Confidential Compute Attestation
Red Hat Openshift Container Platform 4
Vendor
CVE Published:
15 July 2026

What is CVE-2026-15809?

A significant vulnerability exists in CRI-O, stemming from an inadequate fix for a previous flaw. This issue permits an attacker who can influence container environment variables to inject newline characters into the HOME variable. Consequently, malicious actors could manipulate the /etc/passwd file by introducing arbitrary entries, posing a severe risk to system integrity and security. This vulnerability highlights the importance of robust validation procedures in container environments.

References

https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-15809
vdb-entryx_refsource_REDHAT
https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/cve-2022-4318
technical-descriptionx_refsource_REDHAT
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2500846
issue-trackingx_refsource_REDHAT

CVSS V3.1

Score:
7.8
Severity:
HIGH
Confidentiality:
High
Integrity:
High
Availability:
High
Attack Vector:
Local
Attack Complexity:
Low
Privileges Required:
Low
User Interaction:
None
Scope:
Unchanged

Timeline

  • Vulnerability published

  • Vulnerability Reserved

Credit

Red Hat would like to thank Nebojša Jaćović for reporting this issue.
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