GHSA-hfvc-g4fc-pqhx
opentelemetry-go: BSD kenv command not using absolute path enables PATH hijacking
At a glance
- Published
- Updated
- CVE
- CVE-2026-39883
- Aliases
- GO-2026-5426
- CVSS_V4
- CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:H/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:H/VI:H/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
Description
## Summary The fix for GHSA-9h8m-3fm2-qjrq (CVE-2026-24051) changed the Darwin `ioreg` command to use an absolute path but left the BSD `kenv` command using a bare name, allowing the same PATH hijacking attack on BSD and Solaris platforms. ## Root Cause `sdk/resource/host_id.go` line 42: if result, err := r.execCommand("kenv", "-q", "smbios.system.uuid"); err == nil { Compare with the fixed Darwin path at line 58: result, err := r.execCommand("/usr/sbin/ioreg", "-rd1", "-c", "IOPlatformExpertDevice") The `execCommand` helper at `sdk/resource/host_id_exec.go` uses `exec.Command(name, arg...)` which searches `$PATH` when the command name contains no path separator. Affected platforms (per build tag in `host_id_bsd.go:4`): DragonFly BSD, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris. The `kenv` path is reached when `/etc/hostid` does not exist (line 38-40), which is common on FreeBSD systems. ## Attack 1. Attacker has local access to a system running a Go application that imports `go.opentelemetry.io/otel/sdk` 2. Attacker places a malicious `kenv` binary earlier in `$PATH` 3. Application initializes OpenTelemetry resource detection at startup 4. `hostIDReaderBSD.read()` calls `exec.Command("kenv", ...)` which resolves to the malicious binary 5. Arbitrary code executes in the context of the application Same attack vector and impact as CVE-2026-24051. ## Suggested Fix Use the absolute path: if result, err := r.execCommand("/bin/kenv", "-q", "smbios.system.uuid"); err == nil { On FreeBSD, `kenv` is located at `/bin/kenv`.
Affected packages
| Package | Versions |
|---|---|
| Go · go.opentelemetry.io/otel/sdk | introduced 1.15.0, fixed 1.43.0 |
References
- https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-go/security/advisories/GHSA-hfvc-g4fc-pqhx WEB
- https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-39883 ADVISORY
- https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-go PACKAGE
- http://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-go/releases/tag/v1.43.0 WEB
Sources
| Source | Licence |
|---|---|
| OSV.dev | CC-BY 4.0 — GitHub Advisory Database |