CVE-2026-121885 (CVSS 6.5)

Description

A flaw was found in Podman. An attacker can trigger a Denial of Service (DoS) by supplying a container image containing crafted metadata labels. Podman's auto-update mechanism improperly trusts these image labels to determine which system services to restart. If a user runs the malicious container and auto-update processes it, arbitrary system services are restarted with the user's privileges, potentially allowing an attacker to shut down the host system when Podman runs with administrative privileges.

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CVSS v3.1 Score

6.5

MEDIUM

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

EPSS — Exploit Prediction

0.0038

Probability of exploitation

0.32%

Percentile rank

EPSS estimates the probability that this vulnerability will be exploited in the wild within the next 30 days. A higher score means more likely to be exploited.

Weakness Type (CWE)

CWE-807 CWE-807

References

Other References

https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-121885 https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2566844 https://github.com/podman-container-tools/podman/security/advisories/GHSA-55rm-rwr7-q2wr

Frequently Asked Questions

What is CVE-2026-121885? +

A flaw was found in Podman. An attacker can trigger a Denial of Service (DoS) by supplying a container image containing crafted metadata labels. Podman's auto-update mechanism improperly trusts these image labels to determine which system services to restart. If a user runs the malicious container and auto-update processes it, arbitrary system services are restarted with the user's privileges, potentially allowing an attacker to shut down the host system when Podman runs with administrative privileges. It has a CVSS v3.1 base score of 6.5 (MEDIUM).

How severe is CVE-2026-121885? +

CVE-2026-121885 has a CVSS v3.1 score of 6.5 out of 10, rated MEDIUM. This is a medium-severity vulnerability that should be remediated as part of regular maintenance. The EPSS score is 0.0038, placing it in the 0th percentile for exploitation probability.

How do I check if I'm vulnerable to CVE-2026-121885? +

You can use Secably's free Website Scanner to check your website for known vulnerabilities. For infrastructure scanning, use the Port Scanner to identify exposed services that may be affected. Check the vendor advisories linked above for specific patch and version information.

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