CVE-2025-47284
📋 TL;DR
This vulnerability allows administrative users within a Gardener project to escalate privileges and gain control over seed clusters managing their shoot clusters. It affects all Gardener installations using the GCP provider extension. The issue enables project administrators to compromise the underlying infrastructure.
💻 Affected Systems
- Gardener
- gardener-extension-provider-gcp
📦 What is this software?
Gardener by Gardener
Gardener by Gardener
Gardener by Gardener
⚠️ Risk & Real-World Impact
Worst Case
Complete compromise of seed clusters, allowing attackers to control all shoot clusters managed by those seeds, potentially leading to data exfiltration, service disruption, or lateral movement to other environments.
Likely Case
Privileged project administrators exploiting the vulnerability to gain unauthorized access to seed cluster resources, potentially modifying configurations or accessing sensitive data.
If Mitigated
Limited impact if proper access controls and monitoring are in place, with quick detection of unauthorized seed cluster access attempts.
🎯 Exploit Status
Exploitation requires administrative privileges within a Gardener project, making it accessible to authorized but malicious insiders.
🛠️ Fix & Mitigation
✅ Official Fix
Patch Version: 1.116.4, 1.117.5, 1.118.2, or 1.119.0
Vendor Advisory: https://github.com/gardener/gardener/security/advisories/GHSA-9x73-87fh-54w9
Restart Required: Yes
Instructions:
1. Identify current Gardener version. 2. Upgrade to the appropriate patched version based on your current release line. 3. Restart gardenlet components. 4. Verify the upgrade completed successfully.
🔧 Temporary Workarounds
Restrict Project Administrator Access
allTemporarily reduce the number of users with administrative privileges in Gardener projects to minimize attack surface.
Enhanced Monitoring of Seed Cluster Access
allImplement additional logging and alerting for any access attempts to seed clusters from project administrators.
🧯 If You Can't Patch
- Implement strict least-privilege access controls for Gardener project administrators
- Deploy enhanced monitoring and alerting for suspicious seed cluster access patterns
🔍 How to Verify
Check if Vulnerable:
Check Gardener version and verify if using gardener-extension-provider-gcp with versions below the patched releases.Check Version:
kubectl get deployment -n garden gardenlet -o jsonpath='{.spec.template.spec.containers[0].image}'Verify Fix Applied:
Confirm Gardener version is 1.116.4, 1.117.5, 1.118.2, or 1.119.0 and verify gardenlet component is running the updated version.📡 Detection & Monitoring
Log Indicators:
- Unauthorized access attempts to seed cluster resources from project administrators
- Unusual API calls to seed cluster control plane
Network Indicators:
- Unexpected network traffic between shoot clusters and seed cluster management endpoints
SIEM Query:
source="gardener" AND (event="seed_cluster_access" OR user_role="project_admin") AND action="modify"