CVE-2026-7374 | Kubevirt: kubevirt virt-handler: privilege escalation and node compromise via symlink following vulnerability

A flaw was found in KubeVirt's virt-handler component. This vulnerability allows an authenticated OpenShift user with edit permissions in a single namespace to exploit improper symlink validation when connecting to virtual machine console sockets. By replacing the console socket with a symlink to the host's container runtime (CRI-O) socket, an attacker can hijack virt-handler's privileged connection. This enables the attacker to access any Unix socket on the host, potentially leading to full control of the node and the entire cluster.

Published: 2026-05-26 Last update: 2026-05-28 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Awaiting Analysis，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2026-7374 is rated Moderate Risk (50.2/100): CVSS Critical severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.12%). 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-2026-7374

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 2026-05-27 — 0.12% —

Full EPSS history (1 record total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2026-7374

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
9.9 3.1 CRITICAL
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/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: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: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.
 3.1 6.0 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2026-7374

GitHub Security Advisory for CVE-2026-7374

GHSA-7jcp-v9w4-wjmg · Severity: critical — A flaw was found in KubeVirt's virt-handler component. This vulnerability allows an authenticated...

OS Trackers for CVE-2026-7374

vendor priority summary link
redhat high — https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-7374
suse critical CVE-2026-7374 severity critical: SUSE including 2 source package names (kubevirt-manifests-1.7.0-150700.3.21.1, kubevirt-virtctl-1.7.0-150700.3.21.1), 2 product×package rows across 1 product lines (SUSE Linux Enterprise Module for Containers 15 SP7): Fixed 2. https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-7374/

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2026-7374

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
No affected products in dataset.

References for CVE-2026-7374

cvelogic Threat Intelligence