GHSA-7286-pgfv-vxvh — critical GitHub Advisory (CVE-2023-44981) in maven/org.apache.zookeeper:zooke…

Description

Authorization Bypass Through User-Controlled Key vulnerability in Apache ZooKeeper. If SASL Quorum Peer authentication is enabled in ZooKeeper (quorum.auth.enableSasl=true), the authorization is done by verifying that the instance part in SASL authentication ID is listed in zoo.cfg server list. The instance part in SASL auth ID is optional and if it's missing, like '[email protected]', the authorization check will be skipped. As a result an arbitrary endpoint could join the cluster and begin propagating counterfeit changes to the leader, essentially giving it complete read-write access to the data tree. Quorum Peer authentication is not enabled by default.

Users are recommended to upgrade to version 3.9.1, 3.8.3, 3.7.2, which fixes the issue.

Alternately ensure the ensemble election/quorum communication is protected by a firewall as this will mitigate the issue.

See the documentation for more details on correct cluster administration.

Basic information

Type: reviewed
Severity: critical
Advisory on GitHub: Open advisory ↗
Repository advisory: —
Source code: Browse source ↗
Published (advisory): 2023-10-11 12:30:27 UTC
Updated: 2025-02-13 19:18:15 UTC
GitHub reviewed: 2023-10-11 20:36:50 UTC
NVD published: 2023-10-11

Score	Percentile
0.03%	6.73%

CVSS Scores

Base score	Version	Severity	Vector
9.1	3.1	—	`CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/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: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:N) Service keeps running; no real outage angle.

Identifiers

Type	Value
GHSA	GHSA-7286-pgfv-vxvh ↗
CVE	CVE-2023-44981 ↗

CWEs

CWE id	Name
CWE-639	Authorization Bypass Through User-Controlled Key

Affected packages (3)

Vulnerable version ranges and first patched releases as published by GitHub.

Ecosystem	Package	Vulnerable range	First patched	Vulnerable functions
maven	org.apache.zookeeper:zookeeper	< 3.7.2	3.7.2	—
maven	org.apache.zookeeper:zookeeper	>= 3.8.0, < 3.8.3	3.8.3	—
maven	org.apache.zookeeper:zookeeper	>= 3.9.0, < 3.9.1	3.9.1	—

Authorization Bypass Through User-Controlled Key vulnerability in Apache ZooKeeper