linuxfoundation argo-cd CVE-2022-29165 in Linux Foundation and Argoproj Products
Published on May 20, 2022

Argo CD will blindly trust JWT claims if anonymous access is enabled

product logo product logo
Argo CD is a declarative, GitOps continuous delivery tool for Kubernetes. A critical vulnerability has been discovered in Argo CD starting with version 1.4.0 and prior to versions 2.1.15, 2.2.9, and 2.3.4 which would allow unauthenticated users to impersonate as any Argo CD user or role, including the `admin` user, by sending a specifically crafted JSON Web Token (JWT) along with the request. In order for this vulnerability to be exploited, anonymous access to the Argo CD instance must have been enabled. In a default Argo CD installation, anonymous access is disabled. The vulnerability can be exploited to impersonate as any user or role, including the built-in `admin` account regardless of whether it is enabled or disabled. Also, the attacker does not need an account on the Argo CD instance in order to exploit this. If anonymous access to the instance is enabled, an attacker can escalate their privileges, effectively allowing them to gain the same privileges on the cluster as the Argo CD instance, which is cluster admin in a default installation. This will allow the attacker to create, manipulate and delete any resource on the cluster. They may also exfiltrate data by deploying malicious workloads with elevated privileges, thus bypassing any redaction of sensitive data otherwise enforced by the Argo CD API. A patch for this vulnerability has been released in Argo CD versions 2.3.4, 2.2.9, and 2.1.15. As a workaround, one may disable anonymous access, but upgrading to a patched version is preferable.

Github Repository NVD

Vulnerability Analysis

CVE-2022-29165 can be exploited with network access, and does not require authorization privileges or user interaction. This vulnerability is considered to have a low attack complexity. The potential impact of an exploit of this vulnerability is considered to be critical as this vulnerability has a high impact to the confidentiality, integrity and availability of this component.

Attack Vector:
NETWORK
Attack Complexity:
LOW
Privileges Required:
NONE
User Interaction:
NONE
Scope:
CHANGED
Confidentiality Impact:
HIGH
Integrity Impact:
HIGH
Availability Impact:
HIGH

Weakness Types

What is an Information Disclosure Vulnerability?

The product exposes sensitive information to an actor that is not explicitly authorized to have access to that information.

CVE-2022-29165 has been classified to as an Information Disclosure vulnerability or weakness.

What is an authentification Vulnerability?

When an actor claims to have a given identity, the software does not prove or insufficiently proves that the claim is correct.

CVE-2022-29165 has been classified to as an authentification vulnerability or weakness.

Authentication Bypass by Spoofing

This attack-focused weakness is caused by improperly implemented authentication schemes that are subject to spoofing attacks.


Products Associated with CVE-2022-29165

You can be notified by email with stack.watch whenever vulnerabilities like CVE-2022-29165 are published in these products:

 
 

Affected Versions

argoproj argo-cd:

Exploit Probability

EPSS
1.63%
Percentile
81.60%

EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) scores estimate the probability that a vulnerability will be exploited in the wild within the next 30 days. The percentile shows you how this score compares to all other vulnerabilities.