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Improper Privilege ManagementWeakness · CWE-269

CVE-2024-22036

CRITICAL · 9.1 CVSS v3.1 Published 2025-04-16
Mitigation only
No fix yet — a mitigation exists. There is no fixed release. A documented workaround reduces exposure in the meantime.
See remediation →
97/100
Remediation priority · Urgent
Remotely reachable 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
A vulnerability has been identified within Rancher where a cluster or node driver can be used to escape the chroot jail and gain root access to the Rancher container itself. In production environments, further privilege escalation is possible based on living off the land within the Rancher container itself. For the test and development environments, based on a –privileged Docker container, it is possible to escape the Docker container and gain execution access on the host system. This issue affects rancher: from 2.7.0 before 2.7.16, from 2.8.0 before 2.8.9, from 2.9.0 before 2.9.3.

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

Rancher versions 2.7.x before 2.7.16, 2.8.x before 2.8.9, and 2.9.x before 2.9.3 contain a vulnerability where cluster or node drivers can escape the chroot jail mechanism, granting root access within the Rancher container. In privileged Docker development/test environments, this further allows container escape to the host system. In production, attackers can escalate privileges using native container utilities.

MitigationUpgrade Rancher to version 2.7.16, 2.8.9, or 2.9.3 or later. If immediate patching is not possible, restrict cluster/node driver configurations to trusted sources and monitor for suspicious container behavior.

Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.

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
High
User interaction
None
Scope
Changed
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
High
Availability
High

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/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. Identify Rancher version
    Access the Rancher UI and navigate to the footer for the version, or query the Rancher API at /v1/settings/server-version. If running via container/Helm, check the container image tag or Helm release values.
    Affected if The installed version is 2.7.x before 2.7.16, 2.8.x before 2.8.9, or 2.9.x before 2.9.3
  2. Determine if node drivers are enabled
    In Rancher UI, go to Cluster Management > Node Drivers to see if any custom node drivers are listed. Check for non-default drivers such as DigitalOcean, Linode, or custom imported drivers.
    Affected if Node drivers are enabled and configured with any non-default or custom driver source
  3. Determine if cluster drivers are enabled
    In Rancher UI, go to Cluster Management > Cluster Drivers to see if any external cluster drivers (such as Google GKE, Amazon EKS, Azure AKS) are configured or active.
    Affected if Cluster drivers are enabled and external Kubernetes providers are being managed through Rancher
  4. Check container runtime environment
    Inspect the Rancher server container or pod to determine if it is running in privileged mode (docker inspect or kubectl get pod -o json). Also check if Docker socket is mounted into the Rancher container.
    Affected if Rancher container runs with --privileged flag or has the Docker socket (/var/run/docker.sock) mounted, enabling potential host escape

You are affected if Rancher version is below 2.7.16/2.8.9/2.9.3 AND node drivers or cluster drivers are enabled and in use.

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

Upgrade Rancher to version 2.7.16, 2.8.9, or 2.9.3 or later. If immediate patching is not possible, restrict cluster/node driver configurations to trusted sources and monitor for suspicious container behavior.

Recommended fix High confidence

2.7.16 (for 2.7.x line), 2.8.9 (for 2.8.x line), or 2.9.3 (for 2.9.x line) - upgrade to the appropriate version based on your current branch

  1. 1. Identify the current Rancher version by checking the Rancher UI or running `kubectl get deployment rancher -n cattle-system -o jsonpath='{.spec.template.spec.containers[0].image}'`
  2. 2. Create a complete backup of the Rancher environment including etcd snapshots and Rancher-specific backups
  3. 3. Test the upgrade in a non-production environment first
  4. 4. For Rancher 2.7.x: Upgrade to version 2.7.16 or later
  5. 5. For Rancher 2.8.x: Upgrade to version 2.9.8 or later (note: 2.8.9 exists but 2.8 branch may need to go to latest 2.8.x)
  6. 6. For Rancher 2.9.x: Upgrade to version 2.9.3 or later
  7. 7. After upgrade, verify the Rancher UI is accessible and all workloads are functioning correctly
  8. 8. Review audit logs to ensure no exploitation occurred prior to patching
Caveat Standard Rancher upgrade precautions apply: backup before upgrade, review compatibility notes for your Kubernetes version, and test in non-production first

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

Have this fixed Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation4.0 h
  • Implementation8.0 h
  • Testing6.0 h
  • Review / QA3.0 h
21.0 hours of engineering $3,680
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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-2024-22036 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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