CVE-2026-64676
Kata Containers: Unauthorized mem-agent ttRPC methods let an untrusted host tamper with confidential-guest memory
- State
- Published
- Severity
- 5.7 Medium
- Published
- Aug 7, 2026
- Updated
- Aug 13, 2026
- Reserved
- Jul 20, 2026
Description
Kata Containers is an open source implementation of lightweight Virtual Machines (VMs) that perform like containers. In versions prior to 4.0.0, the kata-agent is vulnerable to an authorization bypass in confidential-guest memory management. In Confidential Containers (CoCo) deployments, the kata-agent enforces an OPA/Rego-based AgentPolicy that must authorize every ttRPC API call, forming the security boundary that prevents an untrusted host from directing the confidential guest. Two ttRPC methods introduced with the mem-agent feature are missing this authorization check, so an untrusted host can invoke them unconditionally regardless of the guest's policy configuration. When mem-agent is enabled (off by default), this lets the host tamper with in-guest memory management by forcing swap, aggressive eviction, or compaction, resulting in attacker-controlled availability and performance degradation of the confidential workload entirely outside the agent-policy boundary. The impact does not include memory disclosure or code execution, and severity is bounded by the precondition that mem-agent must be explicitly enabled. This issue is fixed in version 4.0.0.
Scores
| CVSS | Score | Vector | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3.1 | 5.7 Medium | CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:L/A:L | GitHub_M |
Weaknesses
- CWE-862 Missing Authorization
Affected Products
| Product | Versions |
|---|---|
kata-containerskata-containers |
|
References
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