CVE-2025-2241
Description
A flaw was found in Hive, a component of Multicluster Engine (MCE) and Advanced Cluster Management (ACM). This vulnerability causes VCenter credentials to be exposed in the ClusterProvision object after provisioning a VSphere cluster. Users with read access to ClusterProvision objects can extract sensitive credentials even if they do not have direct access to Kubernetes Secrets. This issue can lead to unauthorized VCenter access, cluster management, and privilege escalation.
Statement
Hive is an operator which runs as a service for provisioning and perform initial configuration of OpenShift clusters. During this process users are creating instances of hive CRDs and other k8s objects, including a Secret containing credentials where Hive take these inputs and invokes openshift-install to create the spoke cluster. During this process it generations additional objects. One of these objects is an instance of a hive CRD called ClusterProvision. The ClusterProvision object contains unintentionally sensitive information, which may be accessed by unauthorized actors.
Mitigation
A few mechanisms are available to reduce the risks and mitigate this vulnerability:
1. Restrict Access to ClusterProvision Objects
Ensure that only trusted users with valid VCenter credentials have read access to ClusterProvision objects.
This can be verified using the following commands:
oc adm policy who-can get clusterprovision
oc adm policy who-can read clusterprovision
2. Rotate VCenter Credentials
Immediately rotate VCenter credentials to revoke access for any users who may have already accessed the exposed credentials.
3. Audit VCenter Users and Roles
Conduct a security audit of VCenter accounts and roles to detect any unauthorized access or configuration changes.
If any suspicious activity is found, revoke access by rotating credentials again (step 2) and taking necessary remediation actions.
Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) Score Details
Info alert:Important note
CVSS scores for open source components depend on vendor-specific factors (e.g. version or build chain). Therefore, Red Hat's score and impact rating can be different from NVD and other vendors. Red Hat remains the authoritative CVE Naming Authority (CNA) source for its products and services (see Red Hat classifications).
The following CVSS metrics and score provided are preliminary and subject to review.
CVSS v3 Score Breakdown
| Red Hat | NVD | cve.org | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Base Score | 8.2 | N/A | N/A |
| Attack Vector | Network | N/A | N/A |
| Attack Complexity | High | N/A | N/A |
| Privileges Required | Low | N/A | N/A |
| User Interaction | None | N/A | N/A |
| Scope | Changed | N/A | N/A |
| Confidentiality | High | N/A | N/A |
| Integrity Impact | High | N/A | N/A |
| Availability Impact | None | N/A | N/A |
Vector
Red Hat: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:N
Understanding the Weakness (CWE)
Confidentiality
Technical Impact: Read Application Data; Read Files or Directories
Attackers can read sensitive information by accessing the unrestricted storage mechanism.
Integrity
Technical Impact: Modify Application Data; Modify Files or Directories
Attackers can overwrite sensitive information by accessing the unrestricted storage mechanism.
Acknowledgements
Red Hat would like to thank Eric Fried (REDHAT) for reporting this issue.
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