CVE-2026-34177 VM lowlevel restriction bypass via raw.apparmor and raw.qemu.conf
Attackers with edit permissions can bypass VM restrictions to escalate privileges to host root via AppArmor and QEMU config injection.
- Exploited in the wild
- Not known
- Login needed
- An administrator
- Attackable
- Over the internet
- Victim action needed
- Not needed
- Fix
- Available
What is CVE-2026-34177?
CVE-2026-34177 is a critical vulnerability in Canonical lxd, published on 9 Apr 2026. An attacker needs administrator access to exploit it, with no action from the victim.
Official description
Canonical LXD versions 4.12 through 6.7 contain an incomplete denylist in isVMLowLevelOptionForbidden (lxd/project/limits/permissions.go), which omits raw.apparmor and raw.qemu.conf from the set of keys blocked under the restricted.virtual-machines.lowlevel=block project restriction. A remote attacker with can_edit permission on a VM instance in a restricted project can inject an AppArmor rule and a QEMU chardev configuration that bridges the LXD Unix socket into the guest VM, enabling privilege escalation to LXD cluster administrator and subsequently to host root.
Weakness: CWE-184
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-34177?
3 open source packages ship an affected version, including github.com/canonical/lxd. It affects 1 product.
| Package | Affected | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|
github.com/canonical/lxd Go | From 0.0.0-20210305023314-538ac3df036e | None |
github.com/canonical/lxd Go | From 0.0.0-20210305023314-538ac3df036e to 0.0.0-20260226085519-736f34afb267 | None |
github.com/canonical/lxd Go | From 0.0.0-20210305023314-538ac3df036e to 0.0.0-20260226085519-736f34afb267 | None |
Products include Canonical Lxd.
How do I fix CVE-2026-34177?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Is CVE-2026-34177 being exploited?
It is not confirmed as exploited in the wild, but public exploit code for CVE-2026-34177 exists.
Other vulnerabilities in Canonical lxd
- CVE-2026-66897 Instance template path traversal allows arbitrary host file write as root
- CVE-2026-62420 Cross-project cluster migration bypasses project restrictions via cluster notification flag
- CVE-2026-63293 Arbitrary File Read/Write: metadata.yaml symlink in image allows host filesystem access as root
- CVE-2026-63294 Root RCE via image backup.yaml symlink
- CVE-2026-63296 Project restriction bypass via instance migration config override
Sources
Also known as DEBIAN-CVE-2026-34177, GHSA-fm2x-c5qw-4h6f, GO-2026-5368, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-34177.