CVE-2026-23881 | Kyverno Denial of Service via Context Variable Amplification in Policy Engine

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Kyverno is a policy engine designed for cloud native platform engineering teams. Versions prior to 1.16.3 and 1.15.3 have unbounded memory consumption in Kyverno's policy engine that allows users with policy creation privileges to cause denial of service by crafting policies that exponentially amplify string data through context variables. Versions 1.16.3 and 1.15.3 contain a patch for the vulnerability.

Published: 2026-01-27 Last update: 2026-06-17 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Analyzed，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2026-23881 is rated High Exploit Risk (60.4/100): CVSS High severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.53%). 1 public exploit reference(s) are indexed (Exploit-DB). Public exploits are available—assess exposure, apply mitigations, and prioritize patching.

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

Public exploit references (Exploit-DB) for CVE-2026-23881

EDB-ID Source Kind Published Link
— nvd_ref exploit_tag Exploit-DB ↗

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2026-23881

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 0.05% 0.53% +0.48%
2 2026-02-28 0.04% 0.05% +0.02%
3 2026-01-28 — 0.04% —

Full EPSS history (3 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2026-23881

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
7.7 3.1 HIGH
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:N/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:L)
A normal user session is enough; they don’t have to be admin.
User interaction (UI:N)
Nobody has to click “OK” or open a trap file; it can work without a victim helping.
Scope (S:C)
Breaking this can reach past the original component and bite other resources—bigger blast radius.
Confidentiality (C:N)
Doesn’t really leak secrets in a meaningful way.
Integrity (I:N)
Data isn’t meaningfully altered or forged.
Availability (A:H)
Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.
 3.1 4.0 [email protected]
6.5 3.1 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/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:L)
A normal user session is enough; they don’t have to be admin.
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:N)
Doesn’t really leak secrets in a meaningful way.
Integrity (I:N)
Data isn’t meaningfully altered or forged.
Availability (A:H)
Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.
 2.8 3.6 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2026-23881

GitHub Security Advisory for CVE-2026-23881

GHSA-r2rj-wwm5-x6mq · Severity: high · Ecosystem: go — Kyverno Denial of Service via Context Variable Amplification in Policy Engine

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2026-23881

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
kyverno kyverno < 1.15.3 cpe:2.3:a:kyverno:kyverno:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
kyverno kyverno >= 1.16.0, < 1.16.3 cpe:2.3:a:kyverno:kyverno:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2026-23881

cvelogic Threat Intelligence