CVE-2016-4572
Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.
NVD · uneditedIn Cloudera CDH before 5.7.1, Impala REVOKE ALL ON SERVER commands do not revoke all privileges.
Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.
dbcve analysis · moderate confidenceIn Cloudera CDH before version 5.7.1, Impala's REVOKE ALL ON SERVER command fails to properly revoke all privileges from users, leaving them with unintended access to the server and its resources.
Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.
Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.
NVD · CPE data= 5.5.0= 5.5.1= 5.5.2= 5.5.3= 5.5.4= 5.6.0= 5.6.1= 5.7.0CVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.
From the vector- Attack vector
- Network
- Complexity
- Low
- Privileges
- Low
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Am I affected? How to checkSteps we derive from the advisory and the affected-version data, so you can decide whether this CVE reaches your setup. They are a guide, not a scan — your own configuration is the authority.
dbcve checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Identify the Cloudera CDH versionRun 'hadoop version' or check Cloudera Manager UI under Clusters > Cluster Name > Status > Version. Alternatively, check /etc/cloudera-scm-cmxtab or the CM database for the CDH version.Affected if The installed version is 5.5.0, 5.5.1, 5.5.2, 5.5.3, 5.5.4, 5.6.0, 5.6.1, or 5.7.0.
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Confirm Impala service is deployedIn Cloudera Manager, navigate to Clusters and verify Impala is listed as a running service. From command line, run 'impala-shell' or check /var/run/cloudera-scm-agent/process/ for Impala processes.Affected if Impala is installed and running as part of the CDH cluster.
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Check for REVOKE ALL ON SERVER usageQuery Impala's audit logs or privilege tables. In Impala-shell, run 'SHOW GRANT ROLE role_name' for any roles that may have had server-level privileges. Check /var/log/impalad/audit/ for audit logs containing 'REVOKE' commands.Affected if REVOKE ALL ON SERVER has been executed on this Impala instance.
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Inspect remaining user privileges on SERVER levelIn Impala-shell connected to the metastore, run 'SHOW GRANT USER user_name' for suspected users. Look for any SERVER-level grants that should have been removed after a REVOKE ALL ON SERVER command was issued.Affected if Users retain SERVER-level privileges (such as ALL, CREATE, DROP, INSERT, SELECT, or REFRESH) after a REVOKE ALL ON SERVER command was supposed to remove them.
A user is affected if they run Cloudera CDH versions 5.5.0 through 5.7.0 with Impala deployed, and have executed REVOKE ALL ON SERVER but users/roles still possess unexpected server-level privileges.
Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.
Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.
From vendor dataUpgrade Cloudera CDH to version 5.7.1 or later where the REVOKE ALL command correctly removes all privileges. After upgrading, re-run REVOKE ALL commands to ensure proper privilege removal.
- Consultation4.0 h
- Implementation8.0 h
- Testing6.0 h
- Review / QA2.0 h
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Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2016-4572 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2016-4572 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
No notes yet
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- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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