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CriticalVulnerabilityCVE-2026-61850updated 30 Oct 2026, 20:20 UTC

Kargo: users with project role-editing rights can grant themselves more access

Kargo is a tool that moves software builds through deployment stages. A user who was allowed to manage roles in a project could give themselves, or others, more power than they were supposed to have, including reading secrets.

Fixed in 1.8.14, 1.9.9, 1.10.8 · out Official source
SeverityCriticalCVSS 9.3 of 10
Being exploited?UnclearNo reports either way yet
Fix available?Yes1.8.14, 1.9.9, 1.10.8 · since 30 Oct 2026
How sure is this?Official sourceBacked by an official source

How the attack works simplified

  1. 1Delegated userHas permission to manage Roles or ServiceAccounts
  2. 2Crafts role changeGrants permissions the user does not hold
  3. 3API writes changeUses privileged credentials after a coarse check
  4. 4Gains project adminReads secrets, modifies project resources
  5. ResultAttacker gains Project-administrator access

What happened

Two authorization flaws in Kargo's project-scoped RBAC API let an authenticated user with delegated Role or ServiceAccount management permissions create or bind roles that grant permissions beyond their own. Changes are written with the API server's privileged credentials after only a coarse resource-kind check.

Why it is dangerous: A user can escalate to Project-administrator access, read Project Secrets and credentials, and modify or delete Project resources. Stolen Git, container-registry, or Helm-registry credentials can extend the impact to those external systems. Escalation stays within the affected Project and does not grant cluster-wide access.

Are you affected?

You are affected if you run Kargo from 0.6.0 up to (but not including) 1.8.14, 1.9.9, or 1.10.8 and have created custom roles that grant RBAC-management permissions to users.

Kargo 0.6.0 through 1.8.13, 1.9.0 through 1.9.8, and 1.10.0 through 1.10.7

What to do

  1. Update Kargo to 1.8.14, 1.9.9, or 1.10.8 (or a later version in your release line)
  2. Review custom roles that grant permissions to manage Roles or ServiceAccounts and remove them where not needed
  3. Review Project access for accounts with those custom roles and rotate any Project secrets or external credentials they could have read

Timeline

  1. 30 Oct 2026, 20:17 UTC
    Publicly disclosed
  2. 30 Oct 2026, 20:17 UTC
    Reported by NVD · NVD
  3. 30 Oct 2026, 20:20 UTC
    Picked up by Zero Radar

Sources 1 report, oldest first

Official vendor, government CERT or advisory database

Technical details

ID
CVE-2026-61850
CVSS
9.3 / 10
Disclosed
30 Oct 2026, 20:17 UTC
On Zero Radar
30 Oct 2026, 20:20 UTC (3 min after disclosure)
Last change
30 Oct 2026, 20:20 UTC

The plain-language parts and the attack diagram were written by an AI model (anthropic/claude-haiku-5.5) from the sources above. Facts like versions, exploitation and dates come from the sources themselves. How Zero Radar works

Kargo: users with project role-editing rights can grant themselves more access · Zero Radar