CVE-2022-21679 | Authorization Policy bypass in Istio

Istio is an open platform to connect, manage, and secure microservices. In Istio 1.12.0 and 1.12.1 The authorization policy with hosts and notHosts might be accidentally bypassed for ALLOW action or rejected unexpectedly for DENY action during the upgrade from 1.11 to 1.12.0/1.12.1. Istio 1.12 supports the hosts and notHosts fields in authorization policy with a new Envoy API shipped with the 1.12 data plane. A bug in the 1.12.0 and 1.12.1 incorrectly uses the new Envoy API with the 1.11 data plane. This will cause the hosts and notHosts fields to be always matched regardless of the actual value of the host header when mixing 1.12.0/1.12.1 control plane and 1.11 data plane. Users are advised to upgrade or to not mix the 1.12.0/1.12.1 control plane with 1.11 data plane if using hosts or notHosts field in authorization policy.

Published: 2022-01-19 Last update: 2024-11-21 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Modified，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2022-21679 is rated Moderate Risk (49.2/100): CVSS Medium severity, with medium exploitation likelihood (EPSS 1.07%). Review affected assets and schedule remediation.

Risk is dynamic; we continuously reassess and refresh what is shown on this page as upstream context changes.

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2022-21679

EPSS lead: Daily EPSS estimates relative likelihood of exploitation; percentile ranks this CVE among scored vulnerabilities (higher = more severe relative rank).

# Date Old EPSS score New EPSS score Delta (New - Old)
1 2026-06-15 0.18% 1.07% +0.89%
2 2025-11-21 0.40% 0.18% -0.21%
3 2025-11-18 — 0.40% —

Full EPSS history (9 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2022-21679

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
6.8 3.1 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network—not just someone sitting at the machine.
Attack complexity (AC:H)
Even with access, the exploit needs extra luck, timing, or a fussy environment to actually work.
Privileges required (PR:N)
No account or special rights needed—anonymous or random user is enough.
User interaction (UI:R)
A real person has to do something—click, install, enable—otherwise it doesn’t land.
Scope (S:U)
Damage stays in the same “trust bubble” as the broken component—no big spill into unrelated systems.
Confidentiality (C:H)
Serious risk that confidential data gets exposed in a big way.
Integrity (I:H)
They could widely tamper with or forge data—trust in the data is badly hurt.
Availability (A:N)
Service keeps running; no real outage angle.
 1.6 5.2 [email protected]
9.8 3.1 CRITICAL
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network—not just someone sitting at the machine.
Attack complexity (AC:L)
Once they can reach the bug, pulling it off is straightforward—no weird race conditions or rare setup.
Privileges required (PR:N)
No account or special rights needed—anonymous or random user is enough.
User interaction (UI:N)
Nobody has to click “OK” or open a trap file; it can work without a victim helping.
Scope (S:U)
Damage stays in the same “trust bubble” as the broken component—no big spill into unrelated systems.
Confidentiality (C:H)
Serious risk that confidential data gets exposed in a big way.
Integrity (I:H)
They could widely tamper with or forge data—trust in the data is badly hurt.
Availability (A:H)
Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.
 3.9 5.9 [email protected]
7.5 2.0 HIGH
AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P Click to expand
Access vector (AV:N)
Can be exploited remotely over network reachability.
Access complexity (AC:L)
Exploitation conditions are straightforward and predictable.
Authentication (AU:N)
No authentication is required.
Confidentiality impact (C:P)
Partial confidentiality impact.
Integrity impact (I:P)
Partial integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:P)
Partial availability impact.
 10.0 6.4 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2022-21679

OS Trackers for CVE-2022-21679

vendor priority summary link
redhat medium — https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2022-21679

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2022-21679

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
istio istio 1.12.0 cpe:2.3:a:istio:istio:1.12.0:-:*:*:*:*:*:*
istio istio 1.12.0 cpe:2.3:a:istio:istio:1.12.0:alpha0:*:*:*:*:*:*
istio istio 1.12.0 cpe:2.3:a:istio:istio:1.12.0:alpha1:*:*:*:*:*:*
istio istio 1.12.0 cpe:2.3:a:istio:istio:1.12.0:alpha5:*:*:*:*:*:*
istio istio 1.12.0 cpe:2.3:a:istio:istio:1.12.0:beta0:*:*:*:*:*:*
istio istio 1.12.0 cpe:2.3:a:istio:istio:1.12.0:beta1:*:*:*:*:*:*
istio istio 1.12.0 cpe:2.3:a:istio:istio:1.12.0:beta2:*:*:*:*:*:*
istio istio 1.12.0 cpe:2.3:a:istio:istio:1.12.0:rc1:*:*:*:*:*:*
istio istio 1.12.1 cpe:2.3:a:istio:istio:1.12.1:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2022-21679

cvelogic Threat Intelligence