GHSA-gx3x-vq4p-mhhv
cert-manager-controller DoS via Specially Crafted DNS Response
At a glance
- Published
- Updated
- CVE
- CVE-2026-25518
- Aliases
- BIT-cert-manager-2026-25518, GO-2026-4399
- CVSS_V3
- CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
Description
### Impact The cert-manager-controller performs DNS lookups during ACME DNS-01 processing (for zone discovery and propagation self-checks). By default, these lookups use standard unencrypted DNS. An attacker who can intercept and modify DNS traffic from the cert-manager-controller pod can insert a crafted entry into cert-manager's DNS cache. Accessing this entry will trigger a panic, resulting in Denial of Service (DoS) of the cert-manager controller. The issue can also be exploited if the authoritative DNS server for the domain being validated is controlled by a malicious actor. ### Patches The vulnerability was introduced in cert-manager v1.18.0 and has been patched in cert-manager v1.19.3 and v1.18.5, which are the supported minor releases at the time of publishing. cert-manager versions prior to v1.18.0 are unaffected. ### Workarounds - Using DNS-over-HTTPS reduces the risk of DNS traffic being intercepted and modified. - Note that DNS-over-HTTPS does *not* prevent the risk of an attacker-controlled authoritative DNS server. ### Resources - Fix for cert-manager 1.18: https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/pull/8467 - Fix for cert-manager 1.19: https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/pull/8468 - Fix for master branch: https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/pull/8469 ### Credits Huge thanks to Oleh Konko (@1seal) for reporting the issue, providing a detailed PoC and an initial patch!
Affected packages
| Package | Versions |
|---|---|
| Go · github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager | introduced 1.18.0, fixed 1.18.5 |
| Go · github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager | introduced 1.19.0, fixed 1.19.3 |
References
- https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/security/advisories/GHSA-gx3x-vq4p-mhhv WEB
- https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-25518 ADVISORY
- https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/pull/8467 WEB
- https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/pull/8468 WEB
- https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/pull/8469 WEB
- https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/commit/409fc24e539711a07aae45ed45abbe03dfdad2cc WEB
- https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/commit/9a73a0b3853035827edd37ac463e4803ba10327d WEB
- https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager/commit/d4faed26ae12115cceb807cdc12507ebc28980e2 WEB
- https://github.com/cert-manager/cert-manager PACKAGE
- https://pkg.go.dev/vuln/GO-2026-4399 WEB
Sources
| Source | Licence |
|---|---|
| OSV.dev | CC-BY 4.0 — GitHub Advisory Database |