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Openshift Container PlatformApplication · Redhat

CVE-2019-3899

CRITICAL · 9.8 CVSS v3.1 Published 2019-04-22
Mitigation only
No fix yet — a mitigation exists. There is no fixed release. A documented workaround reduces exposure in the meantime.
See remediation →
100/100
Remediation priority · Urgent
Remotely reachable No privileges Zero-click

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 · unedited
It was found that default configuration of Heketi does not require any authentication potentially exposing the management interface to misuse. This isue only affects heketi as shipped with Openshift Container Platform 3.11.

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 · high confidence

Heketi, as shipped with OpenShift Container Platform 3.11, ships with a default configuration that does not require authentication, exposing the management interface to unauthenticated network access. This allows any user with network access to the Heketi API to manage volumes and perform administrative operations without credentials.

MitigationEnable authentication in Heketi by configuring the 'authenticate' setting in heketi.yaml and providing appropriate admin credentials, then restart the Heketi service to enforce authentication.

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
Openshift Container PlatformApplication
Affected:= 3.11
HeketiApplication
Affected:all versions

CVSS 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
None
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
High
Availability
High

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/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 checks

Work through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.

  1. Locate Heketi deployment
    Check for heketi pods, containers, or services running in the cluster: 'oc get pods -A | grep -i heketi' or 'kubectl get pods -A | grep -i heketi' if kubectl is available
    Affected if Heketi is present in the environment
  2. Find Heketi configuration file
    Locate the heketi.yaml configuration file, typically in /etc/heketi/ or mounted as a configmap in the Heketi pod. For OpenShift 3.11, check the heketi-config-configmap in the namespace where Heketi runs
    Affected if Configuration file exists and is accessible
  3. Check authentication setting
    Inspect the heketi.yaml file and look for the 'authenticate' setting under the 'kubernetes' or 'executor' section. Run: 'oc exec <heketi-pod> -- cat /etc/heketi/heketi.yaml | grep -i authenticate' or examine the configmap directly
    Affected if The 'authenticate' setting is set to false or is absent (defaults to false in vulnerable versions)
  4. Verify API accessibility without credentials
    Attempt to access the Heketi API endpoint without providing any authentication headers. Find the Heketi service URL with 'oc get svc -A | grep heketi' then run: 'curl http://<heketi-service-url>/hello'
    Affected if The API responds successfully without requiring authentication credentials

If Heketi is running and the authenticate setting is disabled or missing in the configuration, the environment is vulnerable to unauthenticated API access.

Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.

Check your environment

Paste your version and any relevant configuration and it will be compared against the affected criteria above. Do not include secrets or credentials.

AI-assisted, checked against the advisory. Informational, not a guarantee.

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.

dbcve · scoped
Mitigation available No clean upgrade yet — mitigate in the meantime
Mitigation

Enable authentication in Heketi by configuring the 'authenticate' setting in heketi.yaml and providing appropriate admin credentials, then restart the Heketi service to enforce authentication.

Recommended fix High confidence

OpenShift Container Platform 4.x (3.11 reached end of life)

  1. Edit the Heketi configuration file (typically /etc/heketi/heketi.json or similar)
  2. Add or enable the 'authentication' setting and configure appropriate authentication credentials
  3. Set 'use_auth' to true in the configuration
  4. Restart the Heketi service to apply the changes
  5. Verify that authentication is now required by attempting to access the management interface without credentials
  6. If using Heketi with OpenShift, ensure the secret containing credentials is properly configured in the relevant topology file
Caveat Enabling authentication requires updating any scripts or tools that interact with Heketi to include valid credentials; topology files and Kubernetes secrets may need updates

Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.

Fix this in Openshift Container Platform Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation2.0 h
  • Implementation2.0 h
  • Testing2.0 h
  • Review / QA1.0 h
7.0 hours of engineering $1,240
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References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.

Primary sources

Practitioner notes

Contributed

Peer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2019-3899 in production — separate from our analysis above.

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What this is

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What belongs here
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  • Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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