Vulnary
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Critical· 9.4

CVE-2026-16242

A critical flaw in the Konnectivity proxy-server allows an attacker to connect as an unauthenticated agent and intercept traffic between the control plane and nodes. The issue occurs when the agent-facing listener starts without the required certificate validation flags.

publishedJul 20, 2026
last modifiedJul 30, 2026
sourcesNVD
severity · cvss
9.4
critical · how bad it is
exploitation · epss
<1%
46th percentile · chance of exploitation in 30 days
(ai-assisted) A model wrote this summary from the official data, so double-check it against the source before you act on it. Read the official advisory →
auto-deletes from the system
counting…on Sep 3, 2026

No official fix yet. If none appears within 45 days of first tracking, this entry is removed automatically.

01

Who is affected

Operators of hosted Kubernetes control planes that run the Konnectivity proxy-server without the --cluster-ca-cert flag or token-based authentication.

02

Real-world impact

An attacker who can reach the Konnectivity endpoint could join the routing pool, then read, modify, or drop traffic flowing between the control plane and worker nodes, potentially compromising cluster integrity and confidentiality.

03

Why this severity

The CVSS score of 9.4 reflects that the vulnerability is exploitable over the network, requires no authentication, and can lead to high confidentiality and integrity impact with moderate availability impact. The low attack complexity and lack of user interaction make it highly dangerous.

04

What to do about it

no official fix yet
interim mitigations
  • ›Configure the Konnectivity proxy-server with the --cluster-ca-cert flag and enable token-based agent authentication to enforce client certificate validation.

No official fix or mitigation is documented in the sources yet. Monitor the vendor advisory and apply the patch as soon as it is released.

NVD description

05

Timeline

  1. Jul 20, 2026 · 13d ago
    Published
    Disclosed and added to the National Vulnerability Database.
  2. Jul 30, 2026 · 3d ago
    Advisory updated
    The NVD record was last revised.
06

How it’s attacked

Attack vectorNetwork (remote)
Attack complexityLow
Privileges requiredNone
User interactionNone needed
ScopeUnchanged
Confidentiality impactHigh
Integrity impactHigh
Availability impactLow
07

References & advisories

NVD advisory ↗Search advisories ↗
(ai-assisted) A model wrote this summary from the official data, so double-check it against the source before you act on it. Read the official advisory →