Aiven Operator has cross-namespace secret exfiltration via ClickhouseUser connInfoSecretSource

### Impact A developer with create permission on ClickhouseUser CRDs in their own namespace can exfiltrate secrets from any other namespace — production database credentials, API keys, service tokens — with a single kubectl apply. The operator reads the victim's secret using its ClusterRole and writes the password into a new secret in the attacker's namespace. The operator acts as a confused deputy: its ServiceAccount has cluster-wide secret read/write (aiven-operator-role ClusterRole), and it trusts user-supplied namespace values in spec.connInfoSecretSource.namespace without validation. No admission webhook enforces this boundary — the ServiceUser webhook returns nil, and no ClickhouseUser webhook exists. ### Patches This vulnerability is resolved in version 0.37.0. We recommend all users update as soon as possible. ### Credits Credits to Andrés Cruciani for finding and reporting the bug through our [bug bounty program](https://bugcrowd.com/aiven-mbb-og)

Source published

10 Apr 2026 17:22:00 UTC

Source modified

25 Jun 2026 19:56:33 UTC

Observed here

24 Oct 2026 13:19:41 UTC

Source terms

GitHub Advisory Database · CC-BY-4.0

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This view projects the publisher's source fields for reading; the original JSON retains additional fields and CVE enrichment containers. Attribution: osv · GitHub Advisory Database · CC-BY-4.0. Source text is retained; field grouping and change labels are provided by ChangeIntel.

CVSS_V3 · CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:N/A:N

Publisher rating · MODERATE