What is the CVSS score of CVE-2026-22039?

CVE-2026-22039 has a CVSS 3.1 base score of 9.9 (Critical). CVSS vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H. EPSS exploitation probability: 0.1%.

Is there a public PoC exploit available for CVE-2026-22039?

Yes, a public proof-of-concept exploit is available for CVE-2026-22039. Prioritise patching immediately. EPSS: 0.1%.

How to fix or mitigate CVE-2026-22039?

Within 24 hours: Identify all Kyverno deployments and current versions across production and non-production environments; assess which clusters enforce critical security policies via Kyverno. Within 7 days: Apply vendor patches to upgrade all instances to version 1.16.3 or 1.15.3 or later; validate policy enforcement post-upgrade through testing. Within 30 days: Conduct audit of policy activity logs during vulnerable window to detect potential unauthorized policy modifications; review and strengthen RBAC controls around Kyverno policy management.

Kyverno CVE-2026-22039

CRITICAL

Improper Privilege Management (CWE-269)

2026-01-27 security-advisories@github.com

GHSA-8p9x-46gm-qfx2

Kubernetes Kyverno Suse

9.9

CVSS 3.1 · GitHub Advisory

View

Attack ChainAIDerived

Hypothetical attack flow derived from CVE metadata – not a confirmed exploit chain

Access

Authenticate as user with Policy creation rights
Exploit

Create namespaced Policy with malicious apiCall
Execution

Kyverno executes API request as admission controller
Impact

Access cross-namespace resources with elevated privileges

Vulnerability Assessment

Weakness	CWE CWE-269 OWASP Top 10:2025 A06:2025 - Insecure Design ASVS 5.0 V8 - Authorization Least privilege enforcement MITRE ATT&CK 1 technique across 1 tactic: Privilege Escalation The technique list with ATT&CK links and the kill-chain view is part of the Basic plan and up. Sign in to read
Exploitation Conditions	Authenticated user account with permission to create namespaced Kyverno Policies in at least one namespace. Kyverno admission controller ServiceAccount must have elevated permissions beyond the policy's namespace. Requires Kyverno versions prior to 1.16.3 or 1.15.3.
Impact	CVSS 9.9 with PoC and patch. Kyverno is a widely-used Kubernetes policy engine. Bypassing admission policies undermines the entire cluster security model.
Exploit ScenarioDerived	An attacker exploits the privilege escalation to deploy workloads that bypass all Kyverno policies, including security restrictions, resource limits, and compliance checks.

Act Now Prioritize within 24-48h. Why: CRITICAL severity + public POC available.

Patch available 0.1% exploitation probability (EPSS)

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AnalysisAIv1 – Mar 12, 2026

Kyverno Kubernetes policy engine prior to 1.x has a privilege escalation vulnerability (CVSS 9.9) allowing policy bypass and unauthorized cluster operations.

Earlier versions of this analysis (1)

v1 Mar 12, 2026 - 21:55 CVSS 9.9

Privilege escalation in Kyverno policy engine enables Kubernetes cluster compromise.

RemediationAI

Update Kyverno. Review deployed workloads for policy violations.

Affected Packages

go github.com/kyverno/kyverno fix: 1.15.3, 1.16.3

Source: OSV (Open Source Vulnerabilities)

Affects your stack

Affects 1 package in go

Checking this CVE against your own stacks and servers is part of the Basic plan and up.

Technical ContextAI · show details

Kyverno has a CWE-269 improper privilege management vulnerability that allows attackers to escalate privileges and bypass Kubernetes admission policies.

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Exploit and PoC references, threat intelligence from 22 sources

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Severity by source

GitHub Advisory PRIMARY 9.9 CRITICAL

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

SUSE CRITICAL

Primary rating from GitHub Advisory.

CVSS VectorGitHub Advisory

Attack Vector

Network

Attack Complexity

Low

Privileges Required

Low

User Interaction

None

Scope

Changed

Confidentiality

High

Integrity

High

Availability

High

Lifecycle Timeline

PoC Detected

Feb 02, 2026 - 15:13 vuln.today

Public exploit code

Patch released

Feb 02, 2026 - 15:13 nvd

Patch available

CVE Published

Jan 27, 2026 - 17:16 nvd

CRITICAL 9.9

DescriptionGitHub Advisory

Kyverno is a policy engine designed for cloud native platform engineering teams. Versions prior to 1.16.3 and 1.15.3 have a critical authorization boundary bypass in namespaced Kyverno Policy apiCall. The resolved urlPath is executed using the Kyverno admission controller ServiceAccount, with no enforcement that the request is limited to the policy’s namespace. As a result, any authenticated user with permission to create a namespaced Policy can cause Kyverno to perform Kubernetes API requests using Kyverno’s admission controller identity, targeting any API path allowed by that ServiceAccount’s RBAC. This breaks namespace isolation by enabling cross-namespace reads (for example, ConfigMaps and, where permitted, Secrets) and allows cluster-scoped or cross-namespace writes (for example, creating ClusterPolicies) by controlling the urlPath through context variable substitution. Versions 1.16.3 and 1.15.3 contain a patch for the vulnerability.

Executive ViewAI

Why It Matters

Kyverno versions prior to 1.16.3 and 1.15.3 contain a critical authorization bypass vulnerability (CVSS 9.9) that allows attackers to circumvent namespace-level policy enforcement in cloud native environments. Any organization running vulnerable Kyverno instances faces immediate risk of unauthorized policy manipulation and potential cluster compromise, particularly in multi-tenant Kubernetes deployments.

Business Impact: Severe

Compensating Controls

Apply vendor patch.

Threat Intelligence Overview

EPSS Score

0.1%

Top 84% exploitable

Exploit

POC

Public exploit code exists

Data Quality

4 sources

Confidence: Medium

NVD

CVE.org

EPSS Vendor

GitHub

VulDB

How this decision was reached

The engine reads each signal below and applies a fixed list of rules from top to bottom. The first rule that matches sets the recommended action – like a statement, every line is shown.

SignalValue

Severity CRITICAL

CISA KEV No

Public POC Yes

EPSS 0.1%

Patch available Yes

Active threat No

Deciding rule

CRITICAL severity + public POC available

What every action level means

Emergency Immediate action required. Criteria: CRITICAL + in CISA KEV (actively exploited) without patch, OR CRITICAL + EPSS > 30% without patch, OR CRITICAL + active threat signals without patch.

Act Now Prioritize within 24-48h. Criteria: in KEV with patch available, OR CRITICAL + public POC, OR HIGH + EPSS > 10%, OR CRITICAL + active threat, OR any CRITICAL severity.

This Week Schedule remediation this week. Criteria: HIGH severity (CVSS 7.0-8.9). Patch within normal change window.

This Month Plan within 30 days. Criteria: MEDIUM severity (CVSS 4.0-6.9), lower exploitation probability. Include in regular patch cycle.

Monitor Track and reassess. Criteria: LOW severity (CVSS 0.1-3.9), minimal exploitation risk. No immediate action needed.

SSVC AssessmentENISA

SSVC Decision· derived

Out-of-Cycle

Exploitation· derived

Poc

System Exposure· derived

Open

Automatable· derived

Human Impact

Very High

Priority Score

Low Medium High Critical

KEV: 0

EPSS: 0

CVSS: +50

PoC: +20

Weaponized: 0

Threat intel: 0

Gov advisory: 0

Affected Products (CPE)GitHub Advisory

cpe:2.3:a:kyverno:kyverno:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

More in Kyverno

View all

CVE-2026-54523 CRITICAL Act Now POC

9.6 Aug 26

Cross-namespace privilege escalation in Kyverno 1.18.0-1.18.1 lets any tenant who can create a NamespacedMutatingPolicy

CVE-2024-48921 HIGH This Week POC

8.7 Oct 29

Kyverno is a policy engine designed for Kubernetes. Rated high severity (CVSS 8.7), this vulnerability is remotely explo

CVE-2025-46342 HIGH This Week POC

8.5 Apr 30

Kyverno is a policy engine designed for cloud native platform engineering teams. Rated high severity (CVSS 8.5), this vu

CVE-2026-23881 HIGH This Week POC

7.7 Jan 27

Kyverno versions up to 1.16.3 is affected by allocation of resources without limits or throttling (CVSS 7.7).

CVE-2025-29778 MEDIUM This Month POC

5.8 Mar 24

Kyverno is a policy engine designed for cloud native platform engineering teams. Rated medium severity (CVSS 5.8), this

CVE-2026-4789 CRITICAL Act Now

9.8 Mar 30

Kyverno versions 1.16.0 and later contain a server-side request forgery vulnerability in unrestricted CEL HTTP functions

CVE-2026-100706 CRITICAL Act Now

9.4 Sep 26

Privilege escalation in Kyverno before 1.19.1 allows an authenticated Kubernetes namespace tenant with Policy/apiCall au

CVE-2026-84200 CRITICAL Act Now

9.4 Sep 01

Policy enforcement bypass in Kyverno v1.9.0 through v1.12.7 lets an authenticated Kubernetes user evade an enforce-mode

CVE-2023-33191 HIGH This Week

8.8 May 30

Kyverno is a policy engine designed for Kubernetes. Rated high severity (CVSS 8.8), this vulnerability is remotely explo

CVE-2026-100707 HIGH This Week

8.3 Sep 26

Cross-namespace information disclosure in Kyverno before 1.19.1 allows an authenticated low-privilege tenant to read res

CVE-2026-84195 HIGH This Week

8.3 Sep 01

Credential leakage in Kyverno's apiCall service mode automatically forwards the Kubernetes admission controller's Servic

CVE-2026-84196 HIGH This Week

8.3 Sep 01

Server-side request forgery in Kyverno's Kubernetes admission controller (all versions before 1.18.0) enables any authen

Same weakness CWE-269 – Improper Privilege Management

View all

CVE-2017-5689 CRITICAL POC

9.8

CVE-2021-20021 CRITICAL POC

9.8

CVE-2017-12635 CRITICAL POC

9.8

CVE-2012-3993 CRITICAL POC

9.3

CVE-2017-11467 CRITICAL POC

9.8

CVE-2014-1510 CRITICAL POC

9.8

CVE-2014-1511 CRITICAL POC

9.8

CVE-2019-1405 HIGH POC

7.8

Vendor StatusVendor

SUSE

Severity: Critical

Product	Status
openSUSE Leap 15.6	Fixed
SUSE Linux Enterprise Module for Package Hub 15 SP5	Fixed
SUSE Linux Enterprise Module for Package Hub 15 SP6	Fixed
openSUSE Leap 15.5	Fixed

References

Advisories & patches

PATCH https://github.com/kyverno/kyverno/commit/e0ba4de4f1e0ca325066d5095db51aec45b1407b PATCH https://github.com/kyverno/kyverno/commit/eba60fa856c781bcb9c3be066061a3df03ae4e3e ADVISORY https://vuldb.com/vuln/343051 ADVISORY https://www.suse.com/support/update/SUSE-SU-2026:0403/

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