CVE-2026-18673 Kong Mesh: the kuma-dp readiness service exposes the Envoy admin API without authentication
Unauthenticated attackers can access the Envoy admin API via the readiness service to read sensitive mesh configuration and trust bundles.
- Exploited in the wild
- Not known
- Login needed
- Not needed
- Attackable
- Local or same network only
- Victim action needed
- Not needed
- Fix
- None listed
What is CVE-2026-18673?
CVE-2026-18673 is a medium-severity missing authorization vulnerability in Kong Mesh, published on 12 Aug 2026. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Official description
When kuma-dp is configured with the Envoy admin API on a Unix domain socket, which is the default, its readiness service on TCP port 9902 - bound to all interfaces - forwards almost the entire Envoy admin API to any caller that can reach the port, with no authentication.
An attacker with network access to a data plane's port 9902, for example another pod on the cluster network, can read Envoy and data plane configuration without credentials: config dumps, cluster and listener lists, stats, and the mesh trust bundle. Exposure is read-only - destructive Envoy admin actions are blocked and private keys are not exposed.
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-18673?
How do I fix CVE-2026-18673?
No fix has been published for CVE-2026-18673 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.
Upgrade, and check permissions on every request on the server, not only in the interface. More about Missing authorization.
Is CVE-2026-18673 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-18673 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as GHSA-jcrf-7pr5-jv5v, GHSA-r9pv-x3pm-4r2w.