High severity · published Apr 25, 2023
CVE-2023-30549
Apptainer is an open source container platform for Linux
7.8
CVSS
0.4%
EPSS
No
On KEV
Description
Apptainer is an open source container platform for Linux. There is an ext4 use-after-free flaw that is exploitable through versions of Apptainer < 1.1.0 and installations that include apptainer-suid < 1.1.8 on older operating systems where that CVE has not been patched. That includes Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7, Debian 10 buster (unless the linux-5.10 package is installed), Ubuntu 18.04 bionic and Ubuntu 20.04 focal. Use-after-free flaws in the kernel can be used to attack the kernel for denial of service and potentially for privilege escalation.
Apptainer 1.1.8 includes a patch that by default disables mounting of extfs filesystem types in setuid-root mode, while continuing to allow mounting of extfs filesystems in non-setuid "rootless" mode using fuse2fs.
Some workarounds are possible. Either do not install apptainer-suid (for versions 1.1.0 through 1.1.7) or set `allow setuid = no` in apptainer.conf. This requires having unprivileged user namespaces enabled and except for apptainer 1.1.x versions will disallow mounting of sif files, extfs files, and squashfs files in addition to other, less significant impacts. (Encrypted sif files are also not supported unprivileged in apptainer 1.1.x.). Alternatively, use the `limit containers` options in apptainer.conf/singularity.conf to limit sif files to trusted users, groups, and/or paths, and set `allow container extfs = no` to disallow mounting of extfs overlay files. The latter option by itself does not disallow mounting of extfs overlay partitions inside SIF files, so that's why the former options are also needed.
CVSS vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Attack vector
Local
Complexity
Low
Privileges
Low
User interaction
None
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
High
Availability
High
Scope
Unchanged
Exploitation
Is it being used?
Exploit prediction (EPSS)0.4% · higher than 31% of CVEs
Exploited in the wildNo evidence yet
CISA KEVNot listed
Ransomware campaign useNot known
Affected products
Which versions
AP
Apptainer · Lfprojects
before 1.1.8 · source: NVD
EL
Enterprise Linux · Redhat
7.0 · source: NVD
SI
Singularity · Sylabs
All versions, or not specified · source: NVD
References
NVD
https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2023-30549
CVE.org
https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2023-30549
Not Applicable
https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/cve-2022-1184
Patch
https://github.com/apptainer/apptainer/commit/5a4964f5ba9c8d89a0e353b97f51fd607670a9f7
Release Notes
https://github.com/apptainer/apptainer/releases/tag/v1.1.8
Mitigation
https://github.com/apptainer/apptainer/security/advisories/GHSA-j4rf-7357-f4cg
github.com
https://github.com/torvalds/linux/commit/2220eaf90992c11d888fe771055d4de3303
github.com
https://github.com/torvalds/linux/commit/4f04351888a83e595571de672e0a4a8b74f
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