# CVE-2026-76186: Apache Airflow Keycloak provider: Keycloak token cookies not bound to Airflow session identity

> Attackers can pair their own Airflow session with another user's Keycloak tokens to gain unauthorized privileges, requiring the Keycloak auth manager.

- **Severity:** Critical 9.1 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Not needed
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** No
- **Published:** 16 Sep 2026
- **Updated:** 17 Sep 2026
- **Also known as:** GHSA-xhp3-rrf4-c8rv

## What is CVE-2026-76186?

CVE-2026-76186 is a critical authentication bypass vulnerability in Apache Airflow Keycloak provider, published on 16 Sep 2026. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

Apache Airflow Keycloak provider: from Airflow 3.3 the Keycloak auth manager takes a user's identity from the signed Airflow session token but takes the Keycloak access and refresh tokens used for every authorization decision from separate, unauthenticated cookies, and never checks that the two describe the same subject. A user who holds any valid Airflow login of their own, together with another subject's Keycloak access or refresh token obtained out of band, can pair the two: Airflow then authorizes requests with the foreign token's privileges while the session identity, audit log and cache keys continue to name the attacker's own account. The refresh path re-issues an Airflow session token for the original identity carrying the foreign tokens, so the mismatched pairing survives across sessions.

Affects deployments running Airflow 3.3 or later with the Keycloak auth manager. Earlier versions carried the Keycloak tokens inside the signed session token, so the binding existed and was lost when they moved into separate cookies.

Users of apache-airflow-providers-keycloak are recommended to upgrade to version 0.10.0 or later, which binds the cookie-supplied tokens to the session identity.

Weakness: CWE-565 (Reliance on Cookies without Validation and Integrity Checking)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-76186?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Apache Apache-Airflow-Providers-Keycloak.

## How do I fix CVE-2026-76186?

No fix has been published for CVE-2026-76186 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2026-76186 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-76186 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Apache Airflow Keycloak provider

- [CVE-2026-76187](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-76187/): Apache Airflow Keycloak provider: Any realm client's credentials mint an Airflow session JWT (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2026-40948](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-40948/): Apache Airflow Providers Keycloak: OAuth Login CSRF — Missing State Parameter in Keycloak Auth Manager (medium 5.4)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2026-76186 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2026-76186 is a critical authentication bypass vulnerability in Apache Airflow Keycloak provider, published on 16 Sep 2026. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-76186 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Apache Airflow Keycloak provider. 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-2026-76186/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-76186/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-76186
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-76186
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2026-76186

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-76186/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.