OpenBao's Kerberos Auth Method Accumulates Unaccessible Tokens

Exploitation

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

CVSS

5.3 · CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L

EPSS

• CVE-2026-46405: 0.62% estimated exploitation activity in the next 30 days; percentile 49.61 (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.

Impact In OpenBao's Kerberos auth method on the GET handler, or when an Authorization: Negotiate header is supplied, the response is includes a logical.Auth object in addition to an error message. This results in tokens being created with only the default policy, default TTL, and no entity information, which are hidden by the returned error message. No access to these tokens by the caller occurs and the authentication token is not ever made accessible outside of sys/raw. At most this could cause storage usage. Patches This is fixed in OpenBao v2.5.4. Workarounds Users may set a rate limit quota to limit the creation of these paths. As the path is unauthenticated, it isn't possible to deny access to it. Reporter This was discovered by an anonymous reporter.

Published by the source

28 May 2026, 18:55 UTC

Last modified by the source

28 May 2026, 18:55 UTC

Source last checked

26 Oct 2026, 15:22 UTC

1. Revision 1 · created · 26 Oct 2026

   Published from ghsa record GHSA-7j6w-vvw2-5f9c

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# Patch Next advisory brief: CVE-2026-46405

Advisory: OpenBao's Kerberos Auth Method Accumulates Unaccessible Tokens
IDs: CVE-2026-46405, GHSA-7j6w-vvw2-5f9c
Record: https://patchnext.com/advisories/cve-2026-46405 (revision 1, source checked 26 Oct 2026, 15:22 UTC)
Inventory: none attached. This brief comes from a public page and does not say whether any deployment is affected.
Severity: Medium (CVSS 5.3)
Exploitation: no confirmed exploitation recorded. Patch Next confirms exploitation only from CISA KEV.
Vendor response: Vendor fix available; fixed versions by package: github.com/openbao/openbao 2.5.4. A vendor fix does not mean a deployment is fixed.

## Affected components
- Go github.com/openbao/openbao: affected <= 2.5.3; fixed in 2.5.4

## Suggested inspection (read-only)
- Go github.com/openbao/openbao: 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/openbao/openbao.
- 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-7j6w-vvw2-5f9c (GitHub-reviewed advisory GHSA-7j6w-vvw2-5f9c lists affected ranges: Go github.com/openbao/openbao >=0 <=2.5.3)

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