GHSA-2qjp-425j-52j9 CVE-2022-23471 GO-2022-1147
containerd CRI stream server vulnerable to host memory exhaustion via terminal
- Severity
- 5.7 / 10
- Medium · CVSS 3.1
- Exploit chance (EPSS)
- 1.11%
- Chance of exploitation in the next 30 days. Higher than 65.90% of scored vulnerabilities.
- Known exploited
- No
- Not in CISA's catalog
- Weakness
- CWE-400 Uncontrolled Resource Consumption
- CWE-401 Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime
- Fix
1.5.16- Upgrade github.com/containerd/containerd to this version or later
Description
Impact
A bug was found in containerd's CRI implementation where a user can exhaust memory on the host. In the CRI stream server, a goroutine is launched to handle terminal resize events if a TTY is requested. If the user's process fails to launch due to, for example, a faulty command, the goroutine will be stuck waiting to send without a receiver, resulting in a memory leak. Kubernetes and crictl can both be configured to use containerd's CRI implementation and the stream server is used for handling container IO.
Patches
This bug has been fixed in containerd 1.6.12 and 1.5.16. Users should update to these versions to resolve the issue.
Workarounds
Ensure that only trusted images and commands are used and that only trusted users have permissions to execute commands in running containers.
For more information
If you have any questions or comments about this advisory:
- Open an issue in containerd
- Email us at security@containerd.io
To report a security issue in containerd:
- Report a new vulnerability
- Email us at security@containerd.io
Affected versions
Go
| Package | Vulnerable | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|
| github.com/containerd/containerd | < 1.5.16 |
1.5.16 |
| github.com/containerd/containerd | >= 1.6.0, < 1.6.12 |
1.6.12 |
| github.com/containerd/containerd | < 1.5.16>= 1.6.0, < 1.6.12 |
1.5.161.6.12 |
How to fix
Move to the fixed version or later with your package manager, update the lockfile, and run your tests. If the package only arrives through another dependency, upgrade that dependency first. If none of its releases pulls a fixed version yet, force the version with your package manager's override.
github.com/containerd/containerd Go → 1.5.16
- go
go get github.com/containerd/containerd@v1.5.16 && go mod tidy
Severity breakdown
CVSS 3.1 5.7
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
- Attack vector
- Network
- Attack complexity
- Low
- Privileges required
- Low
- User interaction
- Required
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- None
- Integrity
- None
- Availability
- High
Weakness
CWE-400: Uncontrolled Resource Consumption
The product does not properly control the allocation and maintenance of a limited resource.
How to prevent it
- Architecture and Design: Design throttling mechanisms into the system architecture. The best protection is to limit the amount of resources that an unauthorized user can cause to be expended. A strong authentication and access control model will help prevent such attacks from occurring in the first place. The login application should be protected against DoS attacks as much as possible. Limiting the database access, perhaps by caching result sets, can help minimize the resources expended. To further limit the potential for a DoS attack, consider tracking the rate of requests received from users and blocking requests that exceed a defined rate threshold.
- Architecture and Design: Mitigation of resource exhaustion attacks requires that the target system either: recognizes the attack and denies that user further access for a given amount of time, or uniformly throttles all requests in order to make it more difficult to consume resources more quickly than they can again be freed. The first of these solutions is an issue in itself though, since it may allow attackers to prevent the use of the system by a particular valid user. If the attacker impersonates the valid user, they may be able to prevent the user from accessing the server in question. The second solution is simply difficult to effectively institute -- and even when properly done, it does not provide a full solution. It simply makes the attack require more resources on the part of the attacker.
- Architecture and Design: Ensure that protocols have specific limits of scale placed on them.
- Implementation: Ensure that all failures in resource allocation place the system into a safe posture.
CWE-401: Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime
The product does not sufficiently track and release allocated memory after it has been used, making the memory unavailable for reallocation and reuse.
How to prevent it
- Implementation: Choose a language or tool that provides automatic memory management, or makes manual memory management less error-prone. For example, glibc in Linux provides protection against free of invalid pointers. When using Xcode to target OS X or iOS, enable automatic reference counting (ARC) [REF-391]. To help correctly and consistently manage memory when programming in C++, consider using a smart pointer class such as std::auto_ptr (defined by ISO/IEC ISO/IEC 14882:2003), std::shared_ptr and std::unique_ptr (specified by an upcoming revision of the C++ standard, informally referred to as C++ 1x), or equivalent solutions such as Boost.
- Architecture and Design: Use an abstraction library to abstract away risky APIs. Not a complete solution.
- Architecture and Design, Build and Compilation: Consider using the Boehm-Demers-Weiser garbage collector (bdwgc), which can help avoid leaks.
References
Advisories
Packages
Other links
- github.com/containerd/containerd/security/advisories/GHSA-2qjp-425j-52j9
- github.com/containerd/containerd/commit/241563be06a3de8b6a849414c4e805b68d3bb295
- github.com/containerd/containerd/commit/a05d175400b1145e5e6a735a6710579d181e7fb0
- github.com/containerd/containerd/releases/tag/v1.5.16
- github.com/containerd/containerd/releases/tag/v1.6.12
- security.gentoo.org/glsa/202401-31
Timeline
- Published
- Last updated by the source
- Latest EPSS score
Related advisories
| Advisory | Severity | Why it's related |
|---|---|---|
| GHSA-rp3h-jf77-q9p4 containerd: Unpack DoS via repeated opaque whiteouts | Medium | Also affects github.com/containerd/containerd |
| GO-2026-6791 containerd CRI plugin: Checkpoint restore bypasses destination security context | High | Also affects github.com/containerd/containerd |
| GHSA-pg57-6jwg-q645 Containerd has image-pull DoS via crafted OCI index graph amplification | Medium | Also affects github.com/containerd/containerd |
| GHSA-7jxh-36q5-gcqv containerd: CRI ExecSync Goroutine Leak Leads to Node-Level Denial of Service | Medium | Also affects github.com/containerd/containerd |
| GO-2026-5064 containerd CRI checkpoint restore CDI annotation smuggling | Critical | Also affects github.com/containerd/containerd |
| GO-2026-5622 Arbitrary host CRI log file read via symlink following in CRI checkpoint restore | Medium | Also affects github.com/containerd/containerd |
| GHSA-xhf5-7wjv-pqxp containerd CRI — image-config `LABEL` flows to restart-monitor `binary://` logger: host-root command execution from an image pull | High | Also affects github.com/containerd/containerd |
| GO-2026-5338 containerd: CRI checkpoint import allows local image tag poisoning | Critical | Also affects github.com/containerd/containerd |
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