MediumCVE-2026-71846

    Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes: Execution with Unnecessary Privileges (CVE-2026-71846)

    Published Last modified Sources: Red Hat, CVE.org

    What is affected, what to do

    A flaw was found in insights-client. The component's ServiceAccount is bound to a ClusterRole granting cluster-wide secrets get, list, and watch permissions, while the code only requires access to a single specific Secret.

    Update Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.11 to version 1787688993, Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.13 to version 1787259125, Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.14 to version 1786882244.

    Affected
    • Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.11 lt *..1787688993
    • Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.13 lt *..1787259125
    • Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.14 lt *..1786882244
    • Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.15 lt *..1787238585
    • Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.16 lt *..1787184541
    • Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.17 lt *..1787227689
    Fixed in
    • Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.11 1787688993
    • Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.13 1787259125
    • Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.14 1786882244
    • Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.15 1787238585
    • Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.16 1787184541
    • Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.17 1787227689

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    Metrics

    6.5

    Priority

    XIEM Effective CVSS: highest available CVSS rating from NVD and vendor data.

    Source: NVD, CVSS v3

    6.5

    CVSS v3

    Severity Medium on the scale from 0 to 10.

    Source: Red Hat, CVE.org

    0.2 %

    EPSS score

    Low — model estimates < 1% exploitation likelihood.

    Source: FIRST EPSS, percentile 5.2

    Show all metrics
    Severity
    Medium
    Priority (0–325)

    The priority score is a consolidated metric that condenses several individual signals into a single, action-guiding ranking: technical severity (CVSS), exploitation likelihood (EPSS), known-exploited status (KEV) and the context of the affected asset. The aim is to answer the only truly important question in vulnerability management: what first?

    Read in glossary
    55.79 Methodology
    Exploit maturity

    An exploit is code or a technique that specifically uses a concrete vulnerability to force unintended behaviour — such as executing code or escalating privileges. It is the tool that turns a theoretical flaw into a practical attack.

    Read in glossary
    no public PoC known
    XIEM Effective CVSS

    XIEM® is the tiered managed-security operating model from NEOSEC and a registered trademark of NEOSEC GmbH. It extends classic SIEM — the central collection, normalisation and correlation of security-relevant events — with endpoint forensics, network visibility and deception technology, and consolidates them into three building tiers: Sentry, Orchestrate and Command.

    Read in glossary
    6.5 Methodology
    CVSS v3

    CVSS is the globally established, open standard for assessing the technical severity of a vulnerability on a scale from 0 to 10. It describes how easily a flaw can be exploited and what damage it can cause — but not how likely its actual exploitation is. CVSS and the complementary EPSS deliberately answer different questions.

    Read in glossary
    6.5
    EPSS score

    The EPSS score is the absolute model output for an individual vulnerability: the estimated probability of real-world exploitation within the next 30 days, expressed as a value between 0 and 1 (i.e. 0 % to 100 %). A score of 0.42 means „the model estimates a 42 % chance of real-world exploitation within 30 days“.

    Read in glossary
    0.2 %
    Low — model estimates < 1% exploitation likelihood.
    EPSS percentile

    The EPSS percentile is the relative position of a vulnerability within all EPSS-scored CVEs, expressed as a value between 0 and 1. A percentile of 0.90 means „this CVE has a higher EPSS score than 90 % of all other scored CVEs“. Unlike the EPSS score, it is not a probability — but a positioning within a ranking.

    Read in glossary
    5.2
    Low — this CVE sits in the lower 10% of all CVEs scored today.
    KEV status

    The KEV catalogue is a list maintained by the US authority CISA of vulnerabilities for which active exploitation in the wild has been confirmed. It answers not the question „how severe?“ but „is it already being attacked?“ — thereby sharply prioritising patching.

    Read in glossary
    —
    Published
    CISA assessment (SSVC)
    Exploitation: none known · not automatable · Technical impact: partial
    Source: CISA Vulnrichment, as of 14 August 2026
    CWE

    CWE is a catalogue of typical weakness types in software and hardware — such as flawed input validation, unsafe memory handling or poor authentication. Where a CVE names a concrete vulnerability in a concrete product, a CWE describes the underlying class of defect.

    Read in glossary
    CWE-250

    Detection rules

    No NEOSEC detection rule is available for this vulnerability yet.

    Classification under NIS2 and CRA

    Rule-based classification from exploitation status and severity. It does not replace a case-by-case assessment.

    NIS2

    NIS2 is EU Directive (EU) 2022/2555 to raise the level of cybersecurity across the Union. It substantially broadens obligations compared with the first NIS directive: more sectors, mandatory risk management, staged reporting duties and personal accountability of senior management.

    Read in glossary
    Handle the vulnerability in regular vulnerability handling under Art. 21(2)(e) NIS2.
    CRA

    The CRA is EU Regulation (EU) 2024/2847 setting horizontal cybersecurity requirements for „products with digital elements“ — from industrial controllers and software to connected consumer devices. For the first time manufacturers must ensure security across the entire product lifecycle, handle vulnerabilities and provide security updates.

    Read in glossary
    From 11.12.2027, Annex I Part II CRA requires manufacturers of affected products with digital elements to handle vulnerabilities without delay and provide security updates.
    ISO/IEC 27001

    ISO/IEC 27001 is the internationally leading standard for an information security management system (ISMS). It describes a risk-based, process-oriented framework to systematically plan, implement, review and improve information security.

    Read in glossary
    Control A.8.8, management of technical vulnerabilities: assess relevance to your systems, plan remediation and keep evidence.

    Description

    A flaw was found in insights-client. The component's ServiceAccount is bound to a ClusterRole granting cluster-wide secrets get, list, and watch permissions, while the code only requires access to a single specific Secret. This excessive privilege means that a compromise of the insights-client pod or ServiceAccount token would grant an attacker read access to all Secrets across the hub cluster, including managed-cluster kubeconfigs and other sensitive credentials.

    Source: redhat_csaf, cvelistv5, NVD (NIST)

    Affected products

    The following versions are affected. Older releases of the same product line are also vulnerable unless stated otherwise.

    Affected products
    Affected versionsFixed in
    Red HatRed Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.11
    • < 1787688993
    • 1787688993
    Red HatRed Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.13
    • < 1787259125
    • 1787259125
    Red HatRed Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.14
    • < 1786882244
    • 1786882244
    Red HatRed Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.15
    • < 1787238585
    • 1787238585
    Red HatRed Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.16
    • < 1787184541
    • 1787184541
    Red HatRed Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes 2.17
    • < 1787227689
    • 1787227689
    redhatadvanced_cluster_management_for_kubernetes
    • 2.0
    • —
    redhatinsights-client
    • —
    • —

    Vendors and products

    Weakness classes (CWE)

    • CWE-250Execution with Unnecessary Privileges

      Base

      The product performs an operation at a privilege level that is higher than the minimum level required, which creates new weaknesses or amplifies the consequences of other weaknesses.

      Entry at MITRE CWE-250

    References & sources

    Changes to this CVE

    Who changed this CVE and when: NVD (analysis, affected products, CVSS), the CVE publisher (CNA) and additional providers such as CISA (ADP).

    1. Record modifiedRed Hat

      1 individual change: Affected versions (publisher)

      Show the original change
      Individual changes of this event as published by NVD
      TypeActionBeforeAfter
      Affected versions (publisher)added
      —
      Affected value modified. <a href="https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/blob/main/cves/2026/71xxx/CVE-2026-71846.json">CVE-2026-71846</a>

      Source identifier: secalert@redhat.com

    2. Record modifiedRed Hat

      1 individual change: Affected versions (publisher)

      Show the original change
      Individual changes of this event as published by NVD
      TypeActionBeforeAfter
      Affected versions (publisher)added
      —
      Affected value modified. <a href="https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/blob/main/cves/2026/71xxx/CVE-2026-71846.json">CVE-2026-71846</a>

      Source identifier: secalert@redhat.com

    3. Record modifiedRed Hat

      Show 10 original changes
      Individual changes of this event as published by NVD
      TypeActionBeforeAfter
      Affected versions (publisher)added
      —
      Affected value modified. <a href="https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/blob/main/cves/2026/71xxx/CVE-2026-71846.json">CVE-2026-71846</a>
      Referenceadded
      —
      https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2026:60386
      Referenceadded
      —
      https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2026:60389
      Referenceadded
      —
      https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2026:60390
      Referenceadded
      —
      https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-71846
      Referenceadded
      —
      https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2512569
      Referenceremoved
      https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-71846
      —
      Referenceremoved
      https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2512569
      —
      Reference typeremoved
      https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-71846 Types: Vendor Advisory
      —
      Reference typeremoved
      https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2512569 Types: Issue Tracking, Vendor Advisory
      —

      Source identifier: secalert@redhat.com

    4. Initial analysis by NVDNVD

      Show 3 original changes
      Individual changes of this event as published by NVD
      TypeActionBeforeAfter
      Product configurationadded
      —
      OR *cpe:2.3:a:redhat:advanced_cluster_management_for_kubernetes:2.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:* *cpe:2.3:a:redhat:insights-client:-:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
      Reference typeadded
      —
      Red Hat, Inc.: https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-71846 Types: Vendor Advisory
      Reference typeadded
      —
      Red Hat, Inc.: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2512569 Types: Issue Tracking, Vendor Advisory

      Source identifier: nvd@nist.gov

    2 NVD translations into other languages are hidden.

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