Medium severity · published Oct 26, 2026
CVE-2026-76654
Subpath symlinking on Windows nodes permits NTLM coercion
New
5.8
CVSS
0.4%
EPSS
No
On KEV
Description
An NTLM coercion vulnerability exists on Windows nodes when the subPath supplied in a pod's volumeMounts is set to a symbolic link that points to an attacker-controlled network share. When a kubelet resolves symlinks, it does not reject a target that resolves to a UNC path. As a result, the kubelet will transparently attempt to authenticate to the share using NTLM. This allows an attacker to obtain the NetNTLMv2 hash of the account under which the kubelet is running. An attacker could then attempt to crack the hash to retrieve the corresponding password or relay it to impersonate the node, if the node is domain-joined.
CVSS vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:N/A:N
Attack vector
Network
Complexity
High
Privileges
High
User interaction
None
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
None
Availability
None
Scope
Changed
Exploitation
Is it being used?
Exploit prediction (EPSS)0.4% · higher than 37% of CVEs
Exploited in the wildNo evidence yet
CISA KEVNot listed
Ransomware campaign useNot known
Affected products
Which versions
KU
Kubernetes · Kubernetes
v1.34.0 through v1.34.11; v1.35.0 through v1.35.8; v1.36.0 through v1.36.4; v1.37.0 through v1.37.0 · source: vendor
References
NVD
https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-76654
CVE.org
https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-76654
github.com
https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/issues/142098
groups.google.com
https://groups.google.com/g/kubernetes-security-announce/c/Wkv04IFzW8g
www.openwall.com
http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2026/09/23/36
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