Summary
Rancher agents can be hijacked by taking over the Rancher Server URL
Workarounds
If you can't update, please follow the standard security practices including:
- Properly control the expiration and ownership of the domain used as the Rancher URL (the
server-urlof the Rancher cluster). - Enabling DNSSEC as a way to protect against DNS spoofing or hijacking attacks.
- Properly clean up and decommission unused clusters and downstream clusters, instead of leaving them behind. For example, downstream clusters which are alive while the main Rancher server is no longer available.
In some cases, Windows nodes added to RKE2 clusters may not be automatically updated with the desired agent-tls-mode. Windows clusters running at least the August patches (v1.27.16, v1.28.13, v1.29.8, v1.30.4) will be automatically updated. For Windows nodes running older versions of RKE2, this issue can be manually resolved by following these instructions.
If you are running Rancher v2.7.x Windows nodes will not automatically update, and you must follow the above instructions, with the following notes:
- This needs to be done for all existing Windows nodes and any new nodes provisioned.
- You must omit the
DownloadWinsflag, and must instead manually download therancher-winsversion 0.4.18, or greater, from its GitHub repository and place it in the required directories:
a.c:\Windows
b.c:\user\local\bin - You must restart the nodes after running the script, simply restarting
rancher-winsor RKE2 will result in pod networking errors. The only scenario where you do not need to completely restart the node is if the cluster is running versionv1.27.16or higher.
Credits
This issue was found and reported by Jarkko Vesiluoma from Redtest Security.
For more information
If you have any questions or comments about this advisory:
- Reach out to the SUSE Rancher Security team for security related inquiries.
- Open an issue in the Rancher repository.
- Verify with our support matrix and product support lifecycle.
Impact
A vulnerability has been identified within Rancher that can be exploited in narrow circumstances through a man-in-the-middle (MITM) attack. An attacker would need to have control of an expired domain or execute a DNS spoofing/hijacking attack against the domain to exploit this vulnerability. The targeted domain is the one used as the Rancher URL.
SUSE is unaware of any successful exploitation of this vulnerability, which has a high complexity bar.
Please consult the associated MITRE ATT&CK - Technique - Adversary-in-the-Middle for further information about this attack category.
CVE-2024-22030 has a CVSS score of 8.0 (High). The vector is network-reachable, high privileges required, and no user interaction. A CVSS score reflects the worst-case severity of the vulnerability, not your specific exposure. Whether this affects your application depends on whether the vulnerable code is present and reachable in your environment. A fixed version is available (2.7.15, 2.8.8, 2.9.2); upgrading removes the vulnerable code path.
Affected versions
Security releases
Kodem intelligence
Severity tells you how bad this could be in the worst case. It does not tell you whether you are exposed. Exploitability and impact are functions of runtime truth: whether the vulnerable code is present, reachable, and actually executes in your application. A vulnerable package can sit in your dependency tree and never run.
Kodem, an Intelligent Application Security platform, uses runtime intelligence to reveal which vulnerabilities actually execute in production, so teams prioritize the ones that genuinely matter. Kodem's runtime-powered SCA identifies whether this CVE is reachable in your applications.
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A new setting, agent-tls-mode, was added, which allows users to specify if agents will use strict certificate verification when connecting to Rancher. The field can be set to strict (which requires the agent to verify the certificate using only the Certificate Authority in the cacerts setting) or system-store (which allows the agent to verify the certificate using any Certificate Authority in the operating system's trust store). This setting will default to strict on new installs of Rancher v2.8.6, v2.9.0, and newer versions. When upgrading from a prior version, the current value will be kept. If updating from older versions, the settings must be manually configured.
Important: For non-Windows nodes, this is fixed since v2.8.6 and v2.9.0. For Windows nodes, this is fully fixed starting with v2.8.8 and v2.9.2
Patched versions include releases v2.8.8 and v2.9.2.
For non-Windows nodes, the fix was released with v2.7.15. However, if you are running Rancher v2.7.x and have Windows nodes, you must follow the below workaround to address this issue on those nodes.
Frequently Asked Questions
- What is CVE-2024-22030? CVE-2024-22030 is a high-severity security vulnerability in github.com/rancher/rancher (go), affecting versions >= 2.7.0, < 2.7.15. It is fixed in 2.7.15, 2.8.8, 2.9.2.
- How severe is CVE-2024-22030? CVE-2024-22030 has a CVSS score of 8.0 (High). This score reflects the worst-case severity of the vulnerability, not your specific exposure. Whether it represents real risk in your environment depends on whether the vulnerable code is present and reachable.
- Which versions of github.com/rancher/rancher are affected by CVE-2024-22030? github.com/rancher/rancher (go) versions >= 2.7.0, < 2.7.15 is affected.
- Is there a fix for CVE-2024-22030? Yes. CVE-2024-22030 is fixed in 2.7.15, 2.8.8, 2.9.2. Upgrade to this version or later.
- Is CVE-2024-22030 exploitable, and should I be worried? Whether CVE-2024-22030 is exploitable in your environment depends on whether the vulnerable code is present and reachable. A CVSS score is a worst-case rating; it does not account for your specific deployment, configuration, or usage patterns. Kodem, an Intelligent Application Security platform, uses runtime intelligence to show which vulnerabilities actually execute in production, so you can focus on the ones that represent real risk. Get a demo
- What actually determines whether CVE-2024-22030 is exploitable, and how bad it is? Exploitability and impact are not fixed properties of a CVE. They depend on runtime truth: whether the vulnerable code is present, reachable, and actually executes in your application. A high CVSS score on a dependency that never runs is not the same as real risk. Kodem, an Intelligent Application Security platform, uses runtime intelligence to reveal which vulnerabilities actually execute in production, so teams prioritize the ones that genuinely matter.
- How do I fix CVE-2024-22030?
- Upgrade
github.com/rancher/rancherto 2.7.15 or later - Upgrade
github.com/rancher/rancherto 2.8.8 or later - Upgrade
github.com/rancher/rancherto 2.9.2 or later
- Upgrade