External Secrets Operator vulnerable to privilege escalation

Exploitation

No confirmed exploitation recorded. Patch Next marks exploitation only from CISA KEV.

CVSS 4.0

8.3 · CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:H/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N · score source

EPSS

• CVE-2024-45041: 0.59% estimated exploitation activity in the next 30 days; percentile 48.30 (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-03). This is a model estimate, not proof of exploitation or customer exposure.

As published by the source; long descriptions are shortened.

Details The external-secrets has a deployment called default-external-secrets-cert-controller, which is bound with a same-name ClusterRole. This ClusterRole has "get/list" verbs of secrets resources(https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/blob/main/deploy/charts/external-secrets/templates/cert-controller-rbac.yaml#L49). It also has path/update verb of validatingwebhookconfigurations resources(https://github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets/blob/main/deploy/charts/external-secrets/templates/cert-controller-rbac.yaml#L27). As a result, if a malicious user can access the worker node which has this deployment. he/she can: 1. For the "get/list secrets" permission, he/she can abuse the SA token of this deployment to retrieve or get ALL secrets in the whole cluster, including the cluster-admin secret if created. After that, he/she can abuse the cluster-admin secret to do whatever he/she likes to the whole cluster, resulting in a cluster-level privilege escalation. 2. For…

Published by the source

9 Sep 2024, 18:16 UTC

Last modified by the source

18 Sep 2024, 18:44 UTC

Source last checked

26 Oct 2026, 15:05 UTC

1. Revision 1 · created · 26 Oct 2026

   Published from ghsa record GHSA-qwgc-rr35-h4x9

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# Patch Next advisory brief: CVE-2024-45041

Advisory: External Secrets Operator vulnerable to privilege escalation
IDs: CVE-2024-45041, GHSA-qwgc-rr35-h4x9
Record: https://patchnext.com/advisories/cve-2024-45041 (revision 1, source checked 26 Oct 2026, 15:05 UTC)
Inventory: none attached. This brief comes from a public page and does not say whether any deployment is affected.
Severity: High (CVSS 8.3)
Exploitation: no confirmed exploitation recorded. Patch Next confirms exploitation only from CISA KEV.
Vendor response: Vendor fix available; fixed versions by package: github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets 0.10.2. A vendor fix does not mean a deployment is fixed.

## Affected components
- Go github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets: affected < 0.10.2; fixed in 0.10.2

## Suggested inspection (read-only)
- Go github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets: check the installed version with your package manager.

## Supported action
Upgrade each affected component to a fixed version on its release line. For a transitive dependency, upgrade the parent package or add an override or constraint, then regenerate the lockfile. Redeploy every environment that ran an affected version.

## Required regression checks
- Run the test suite and a production build.
- Exercise the features that depend on github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets.
- Repeat the inspection and confirm that only fixed versions remain installed.

## Rollback considerations
- Keep the previous lockfile and deployment artifact. Rolling back reinstates the vulnerable version, so apply any documented mitigation while you fix forward.

## Unresolved questions
- Which deployments run an affected version?
- Exploitation status can change. Check again before lowering the priority.
- Mark the work resolved only after the fixed version is verified in production.

## Sources
- Verified: https://github.com/advisories/GHSA-qwgc-rr35-h4x9 (GitHub-reviewed advisory GHSA-qwgc-rr35-h4x9 lists affected ranges: Go github.com/external-secrets/external-secrets >=0 <0.10.2)

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