# CVE-2017-9792: Privilege escalation in Apache Impala

> A user with ALTER permissions can bypass authorization checks to read data from unauthorized Kudu tables by modifying table properties.

- **Severity:** Medium 6.5 (`CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Any signed-in user
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** No
- **Published:** 3 Oct 2017
- **Updated:** 17 Sep 2024
- **Also known as:** GHSA-92jv-xphv-7f8c

## What is CVE-2017-9792?

CVE-2017-9792 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Apache Impala, published on 3 Oct 2017. Any signed-in user can exploit it over the network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

In Apache Impala (incubating) before 2.10.0, a malicious user with "ALTER" permissions on an Impala table can access any other Kudu table data by altering the table properties to make it "external" and then changing the underlying table mapping to point to other Kudu tables. This violates and works around the authorization requirement that creating a Kudu external table via Impala requires an "ALL" privilege at the server scope. This privilege requirement for "CREATE" commands is enforced to precisely avoid this scenario where a malicious user can change the underlying Kudu table mapping. The fix is to enforce the same privilege requirement for "ALTER" commands that would make existing non-external Kudu tables external.

Weakness: CWE-732 (Incorrect Permission Assignment for Critical Resource)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2017-9792?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Apache Impala.

## How do I fix CVE-2017-9792?

No fix has been published for CVE-2017-9792 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2017-9792 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2017-9792 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Apache Impala

- [CVE-2026-56207](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-56207/): Apache Impala: SAML authentication bypass via forged bearer token (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2018-11792](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2018-11792/): Privilege escalation in Apache Impala (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2017-5640](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-5640/): Auth bypass in Apache Impala (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2026-57866](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-57866/): Apache Impala: Secrets Exfiltration via SSRF (high 8.8)
- [CVE-2026-65181](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-65181/): Apache Impala: RCE via External Data Source Class Loading (high 8.1)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2017-9792 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2017-9792 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Apache Impala, published on 3 Oct 2017. Any signed-in user can exploit it over the network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2017-9792 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Apache Impala. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-9792/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-9792/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2017-9792
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2017-9792
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2017-9792

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From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-9792/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.