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containerd CVE-2026-53489

| EUVDEUVD-2026-41110 HIGH
UNIX Symbolic Link (Symlink) Following (CWE-61)
2026-06-19 GHSA-rgh6-rfwx-v388
Information Disclosure Red Hat Containerd Checkpoint Linuxfoundation
8.2
CVSS 4.0 · Vendor
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Severity by source

Vendor (CNA) PRIMARY
8.2 HIGH
CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:H/VI:N/VA:N/SC:H/SI:N/SA:N/E:X/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X
vuln.today AI
6.5 MEDIUM

Local vector requiring the ability to introduce a checkpoint (PR:L); crossing the container-to-host boundary is a scope change (S:C) yielding high confidentiality only (C:H), with no integrity or availability impact.

3.1 AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:N/A:N
4.0 AV:L/AC:L/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:H/VI:N/VA:N/SC:H/SI:N/SA:N
SUSE
5.5 MEDIUM
AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N
Red Hat
6.5 HIGH
qualitative

Primary rating from Vendor (CNA).

CVSS VectorVendor

Attack Vector
Local
Attack Complexity
Low
Privileges Required
None
User Interaction
None
Scope
X

Lifecycle Timeline

6
Source Code Evidence Fetched
Jul 01, 2026 - 19:28 vuln.today
Analysis Updated
Jul 01, 2026 - 19:28 vuln.today
v3 (cvss_changed)
Analysis Updated
Jul 01, 2026 - 19:28 vuln.today
v2 (cvss_changed)
Re-analysis Queued
Jul 01, 2026 - 19:22 vuln.today
cvss_changed
CVSS changed
Jul 01, 2026 - 19:22 NVD
8.2 (HIGH)
Analysis Generated
Jun 19, 2026 - 02:16 vuln.today

Description PRE-NVD

Disclosed via oss-security. NVD scoring and full description are pending.

AnalysisAI

Arbitrary host file disclosure in containerd's CRI plugin lets an attacker read any file on the Kubernetes node via kubectl logs because the plugin restores container.log from a checkpoint image while blindly following a symlinked path. All containerd 2.x branches before 2.1.9, 2.2.5, and 2.3.2 are affected wherever container checkpoint/restore (CRIU-based) is used. There is no public exploit identified at time of analysis and it is not on CISA KEV, but the flaw was independently reported by numerous researchers and a vendor patch is available.

Technical ContextAI

containerd is the CNCF graduated container runtime that sits beneath Kubernetes (via the CRI plugin), Docker, and many managed platforms, executing OCI containers on the host. The affected code path is the CRI checkpoint/restore feature, which packages a running container's state into a checkpoint image and later rehydrates it - including the container's container.log file. The root cause maps to CWE-61 (UNIX Symbolic Link Following): during restore the plugin recreates the log destination from attacker-influenced checkpoint metadata without canonicalizing or validating that the path stays within the container's log directory, so a symlink embedded in the checkpoint (e.g. pointing container.log at /etc/shadow or /proc/*) is dereferenced with containerd's host privileges. When an operator subsequently runs kubectl logs, the CRI plugin reads and streams the symlink target - an arbitrary host file - back to the requester, crossing the container/host trust boundary.

RemediationAI

Vendor-released patch: upgrade to containerd 2.1.9, 2.2.5, or 2.3.2 depending on your branch (2.1.x → 2.1.9, 2.2.x → 2.2.5, 2.3.x → 2.3.2), as documented in advisory GHSA-rgh6-rfwx-v388 (https://github.com/containerd/containerd/security/advisories/GHSA-rgh6-rfwx-v388); Ubuntu users should apply the packages from USN-8472-1 and USN-8473-1 (https://ubuntu.com/security/notices/USN-8472-1, https://ubuntu.com/security/notices/USN-8473-1). Where immediate patching is not possible, the vendor-recommended workaround is to ensure only trusted images and checkpoints are used - concretely, restrict which registries and checkpoint sources the cluster will restore from, and gate checkpoint restore behind admission controls so untrusted users cannot introduce crafted checkpoint images; the trade-off is operational friction for legitimate checkpoint/restore workflows. If checkpoint/restore is not a required feature, disabling or not enabling CRI checkpoint restore removes the attack surface entirely at the cost of losing container migration/forensic-snapshot capability.

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Vendor StatusVendor

SUSE

Severity: Moderate
Product Status
SUSE Package Hub 15 SP7 Fixed
openSUSE Tumbleweed Fixed
SLES15-SP5-CHOST-BYOS-SAP-CCloud Affected
SLES15-SP6-CHOST-BYOS Affected
SLES15-SP6-CHOST-BYOS-Aliyun Affected

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CVE-2026-53489 vulnerability details – vuln.today
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