Vulnerability-Lookup

CVE-2026-72640 (GCVE-0-2026-72640)

Vulnerability from cvelistv5 – Published: 2026-08-13 19:13 – Updated: 2026-08-13 20:28

Title

Unintended Proxy or Intermediary in Elastic Cloud on Kubernetes Leading to Cross-Namespace Secret Disclosure

Summary

The Elastic Cloud on Kubernetes (ECK) operator reads a list of secret references from an annotation on secrets it manages, and it accepts the namespace recorded in each reference without validating that the reference is authorized for the resource being reconciled. A user whose Kubernetes permissions are limited to their own namespace can write that annotation, trigger a reconcile, and cause the operator to use its cluster-wide secret permissions to copy the contents of a secret from any other namespace into a secret the user can read.

Severity

6.5 (Medium)


                        
                          CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N

SSVC

Exploitation: none Automatable: no Technical Impact: partial

CISA Coordinator · CISA-ADP (v2.0.3)

Decision recorded 2026-08-13 19:49 UTC

CWE

CWE-441 - Unintended Proxy or Intermediary ('Confused Deputy')

Assigner

elastic mitre root

References

1 reference

URL	Tags
https://discuss.elastic.co/t/elastic-cloud-on-kub…

Impacted products

1 product

Vendor	Product	Version	CPE status
Elastic	Eck Operator	Affected: 3.0.0 , ≤ 3.4.1 (semver)	guessed

Show details on NVD website

JSON

To clipboard

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                "id": "CVE-2026-72640",
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      "percentile": "0.16326"
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FKIE_CVE-2026-72640

Vulnerability from fkie_nvd - Published: 2026-08-13 20:17 - Updated: 2026-08-13 21:18

Severity

6.5 (Medium) - CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N

Summary

References

	URL	Tags
	security@elastic.co	https://discuss.elastic.co/t/elastic-cloud-on-kubernetes-3-5-0-security-update-esa-2026-121/389494

Impacted products

	Vendor	Product	Version

JSON

To clipboard

{
  "affected": [
    {
      "affectedData": [
        {
          "defaultStatus": "unaffected",
          "product": "Eck Operator",
          "vendor": "Elastic",
          "versions": [
            {
              "lessThanOrEqual": "3.4.1",
              "status": "affected",
              "version": "3.0.0",
              "versionType": "semver"
            }
          ]
        }
      ],
      "source": "security@elastic.co"
    }
  ],
  "cveTags": [],
  "descriptions": [
    {
      "lang": "en",
      "value": "The Elastic Cloud on Kubernetes (ECK) operator reads a list of secret references from an annotation on secrets it manages, and it accepts the namespace recorded in each reference without validating that the reference is authorized for the resource being reconciled. A user whose Kubernetes permissions are limited to their own namespace can write that annotation, trigger a reconcile, and cause the operator to use its cluster-wide secret permissions to copy the contents of a secret from any other namespace into a secret the user can read."
    }
  ],
  "id": "CVE-2026-72640",
  "lastModified": "2026-08-13T21:18:09.483",
  "metrics": {
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          "attackVector": "NETWORK",
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          "baseScore": 6.5,
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          "confidentialityImpact": "HIGH",
          "integrityImpact": "NONE",
          "privilegesRequired": "LOW",
          "scope": "UNCHANGED",
          "userInteraction": "NONE",
          "vectorString": "CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N",
          "version": "3.1"
        },
        "exploitabilityScore": 2.8,
        "impactScore": 3.6,
        "source": "security@elastic.co",
        "type": "Secondary"
      }
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            {
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          ],
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          "timestamp": "2026-08-13T19:49:12.657686Z",
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    }
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      "type": "Secondary"
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}

GHSA-VVR2-6GX7-CXV9

Vulnerability from github – Published: 2026-08-13 21:36 – Updated: 2026-08-13 21:36

Details

Severity

6.5 (Medium)


                  
                    CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N

Show details on source website

JSON

To clipboard

{
  "affected": [],
  "aliases": [
    "CVE-2026-72640"
  ],
  "database_specific": {
    "cwe_ids": [
      "CWE-441"
    ],
    "github_reviewed": false,
    "github_reviewed_at": null,
    "nvd_published_at": "2026-08-13T20:17:24Z",
    "severity": "MODERATE"
  },
  "details": "The Elastic Cloud on Kubernetes (ECK) operator reads a list of secret references from an annotation on secrets it manages, and it accepts the namespace recorded in each reference without validating that the reference is authorized for the resource being reconciled. A user whose Kubernetes permissions are limited to their own namespace can write that annotation, trigger a reconcile, and cause the operator to use its cluster-wide secret permissions to copy the contents of a secret from any other namespace into a secret the user can read.",
  "id": "GHSA-vvr2-6gx7-cxv9",
  "modified": "2026-08-13T21:36:08Z",
  "published": "2026-08-13T21:36:08Z",
  "references": [
    {
      "type": "ADVISORY",
      "url": "https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-72640"
    },
    {
      "type": "WEB",
      "url": "https://discuss.elastic.co/t/elastic-cloud-on-kubernetes-3-5-0-security-update-esa-2026-121/389494"
    }
  ],
  "schema_version": "1.4.0",
  "severity": [
    {
      "score": "CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N",
      "type": "CVSS_V3"
    }
  ]
}

Sightings

Author	Source	Type	Date	Other

Nomenclature

Seen: The vulnerability was mentioned, discussed, or observed by the user.
Confirmed: The vulnerability has been validated from an analyst's perspective.
Published Proof of Concept: A public proof of concept is available for this vulnerability.
Exploited: The vulnerability was observed as exploited by the user who reported the sighting.
Patched: The vulnerability was observed as successfully patched by the user who reported the sighting.
Not exploited: The vulnerability was not observed as exploited by the user who reported the sighting.
Not confirmed: The user expressed doubt about the validity of the vulnerability.
Not patched: The vulnerability was not observed as successfully patched by the user who reported the sighting.

Detection rules are retrieved from Rulezet.

The MITRE ATT&CK techniques below are AI-generated suggestions, inferred from the description of the vulnerability by the CIRCL/vulnerability-attack-technique-classification-roberta-base model, served locally by ML-Gateway. They have not been verified by an analyst and are provided for guidance only.
The approach is described in our paper Mapping CVEs to MITRE ATT&CK Techniques: A Curated Gold-Set Classifier and the Limits of LLM-Assisted Label Expansion.

Action not permitted

CVE-2026-72640 (GCVE-0-2026-72640)

FKIE_CVE-2026-72640

GHSA-VVR2-6GX7-CXV9

Tags

Sightings

Nomenclature