GHSA-mr4h-qf9j-f665 BIT-vault-2025-6000 CVE-2025-6000 GO-2025-3838
Hashicorp Vault has Code Execution Vulnerability via Plugin Configuration
Critical
Go
- Severity
- 9.1 / 10
- Critical · CVSS 3.1
- Exploit chance (EPSS)
- 0.95%
- Chance of exploitation in the next 30 days. Higher than 61.20% of scored vulnerabilities.
- Known exploited
- No
- Not in CISA's catalog
- Weakness
- CWE-94 Improper Control of Generation of Code ('Code Injection')
- Fix
1.20.1- Upgrade github.com/hashicorp/vault to this version or later
Description
A privileged Vault operator within the root namespace with write permission to {{sys/audit}} may obtain code execution on the underlying host if a plugin directory is set in Vault’s configuration. Fixed in Vault Community Edition 1.20.1 and Vault Enterprise 1.20.1, 1.19.7, 1.18.12, and 1.16.23.
Affected versions
Go
| Package | Vulnerable | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|
| github.com/hashicorp/vault | >= 0.8.0, < 1.20.1 |
1.20.1 |
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/hashicorp/vault Go → 1.20.1
- go
go get github.com/hashicorp/vault@v1.20.1 && go mod tidy
Severity breakdown
CVSS 3.1 9.1
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H
- Attack vector
- Network
- Attack complexity
- Low
- Privileges required
- High
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Changed
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
Weakness
CWE-94: Improper Control of Generation of Code ('Code Injection')
The product constructs all or part of a code segment using externally-influenced input from an upstream component, but it does not neutralize or incorrectly neutralizes special elements that could modify the syntax or behavior of the intended code segment.
How to prevent it
- Architecture and Design: Refactor your program so that you do not have to dynamically generate code.
- Architecture and Design: Run your code in a "jail" or similar sandbox environment that enforces strict boundaries between the process and the operating system. This may effectively restrict which code can be executed by your product. Examples include the Unix chroot jail and AppArmor. In general, managed code may provide some protection. This may not be a feasible solution, and it only limits the impact to the operating system; the rest of your application may still be subject to compromise. Be careful to avoid CWE-243 and other weaknesses related to jails.
- Implementation: Assume all input is malicious. Use an "accept known good" input validation strategy, i.e., use a list of acceptable inputs that strictly conform to specifications. Reject any input that does not strictly conform to specifications, or transform it into something that does. When performing input validation, consider all potentially relevant properties, including length, type of input, the full range of acceptable values, missing or extra inputs, syntax, consistency across related fields, and conformance to business rules. As an example of business rule logic, "boat" may be syntactically valid because it only contains alphanumeric characters, but it is not valid if the input is only expected to contain colors such as "red" or "blue." Do not rely exclusively on looking for malicious or malformed inputs. This is likely to miss at least one undesirable input, especially if the code's environment changes. This can give attackers enough room to bypass the intended validation. However, denylists can be useful for detecting potential attacks or determining which inputs are so malformed that they should be rejected outright. To reduce the likelihood of code injection, use stringent allowlists that limit which constructs are allowed. If you are dynamically constructing code that invokes a function, then verifying that the input is alphanumeric might be insufficient. An attacker might still be able to reference a dangerous function that you did not intend to allow, such as system(), exec(), or exit().
- Testing: Use dynamic tools and techniques that interact with the product using large test suites with many diverse inputs, such as fuzz testing (fuzzing), robustness testing, and fault injection. The product's operation may slow down, but it should not become unstable, crash, or generate incorrect results.
- Operation: Run the code in an environment that performs automatic taint propagation and prevents any command execution that uses tainted variables, such as Perl's "-T" switch. This will force the program to perform validation steps that remove the taint, although you must be careful to correctly validate your inputs so that you do not accidentally mark dangerous inputs as untainted (see CWE-183 and CWE-184).
- Operation: Run the code in an environment that performs automatic taint propagation and prevents any command execution that uses tainted variables, such as Perl's "-T" switch. This will force the program to perform validation steps that remove the taint, although you must be careful to correctly validate your inputs so that you do not accidentally mark dangerous inputs as untainted (see CWE-183 and CWE-184).
- Implementation: For Python programs, it is frequently encouraged to use the ast.literal_eval() function instead of eval, since it is intentionally designed to avoid executing code. However, an adversary could still cause excessive memory or stack consumption via deeply nested structures [REF-1372], so the python documentation discourages use of ast.literal_eval() on untrusted data [REF-1373].
References
Advisories
Packages
Other links
Timeline
- Published
- Last updated by the source
- Latest EPSS score
Related advisories
| Advisory | Severity | Why it's related |
|---|---|---|
| GHSA-88v5-9hxc-f85r HashiCorp Vault Vulnerable to Denial-of-Service via Unauthenticated Root Token Generation/Rekey Operations | High | Also affects github.com/hashicorp/vault |
| GHSA-8r5m-3f66-qpr3 HashiCorp Vault has Server-Side Request Forgery in ACME Challenge Validation via Attacker-Controlled DNS | High | Also affects github.com/hashicorp/vault |
| GHSA-72gw-fmmr-c4r4 HashiCorp Vault May Expose Tokens to Auth Plugins Due to Incorrect Header Sanitization | High | Also affects github.com/hashicorp/vault |
| GHSA-m2w4-8ggf-rj47 HashiCorp Vault has a KVv2 Metadata and Secret Deletion Policy Bypass that leads to Denial-of-Service | High | Also affects github.com/hashicorp/vault |
| GHSA-vp5w-xcfc-73wf Hashicorp Vault and Vault Enterprise vulnerable to a denial of service when processing JSON | High | Also affects github.com/hashicorp/vault |
| GHSA-9g4h-h484-3578 HashiCorp Vault and Vault Enterprise's AWS Auth method may be susceptible to authentication bypass | High | Also affects github.com/hashicorp/vault |
| GHSA-8f82-53h8-2p34 HashiCorp Vault Community Edition Denial of Service Though Complex JSON Payloads | High | Also affects github.com/hashicorp/vault |
| GHSA-7rx2-769v-hrwf HashiCorp Vault ldap auth method may not have correctly enforced MFA | High | Also affects github.com/hashicorp/vault |
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