Description
A vulnerability in Google Cloud Platform's guest-oslogin versions between 20190304 and 20200507 allows a user that is only granted the role "roles/compute.osLogin" to escalate privileges to root. Using the membership to the "lxd" group, an attacker can attach host devices and filesystems. Within an lxc container, it is possible to attach the host OS filesystem and modify /etc/sudoers to then gain administrative privileges. All images created after 2020-May-07 (20200507) are fixed, and if you cannot update, we recommend you edit /etc/group/security.conf and remove the "lxd" user from the OS Login entry.
Affected products
| Vendor | Product | Affected | Fixed |
|---|---|---|---|
| guest-oslogin | 20190304 – < 20200507 | 20200507 |
Fixed in Linux distributions
Distributions backport fixes, so the version that fixes this vulnerability differs per release — upgrade to at least the version shown. From the distributions' security trackers and advisories.
Ubuntu
Security tracker ↗| Release | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ubuntu 20.04 LTS | gce-compute-image-packages | 20190801-0ubuntu4.1 | — |
| Ubuntu 18.04 LTS | gce-compute-image-packages | 20190801-0ubuntu1~18.04.1 | — |
| Ubuntu 16.04 LTS | gce-compute-image-packages | 20190801-0ubuntu1~16.04.1 | — |
| Ubuntu 14.04 LTS | gce-compute-image-packages | No fix yet | — |
SUSE
Security tracker ↗| Release | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| SLES 15 SP2 | google-compute-engine | 20190801-4.38.1 | SUSE-SU-2020:1934-1 |
| SLES 15 SP1 | google-compute-engine | 20190801-4.38.1 | SUSE-SU-2020:1934-1 |
| SLES 12 | google-compute-engine | 20190801-54.1 | SUSE-SU-2020:2200-1 |
openSUSE
Security tracker ↗| Release | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| openSUSE Leap 15.2 | google-compute-engine | 20190801-lp152.5.4.1 | openSUSE-SU-2020:1014-1 |
| openSUSE Leap 15.1 | google-compute-engine | 20190801-lp151.2.25.1 | openSUSE-SU-2020:0996-1 |
Advisories 4
- SUSE-SU-2020:2200-1 Security update for google-compute-engine SUSE / openSUSE Security Updates · Feb 4, 2026
- openSUSE-SU-2020:1014-1 Security update for google-compute-engine SUSE / openSUSE Security Updates · Feb 4, 2026
- SUSE-SU-2020:1934-1 Security update for google-compute-engine SUSE / openSUSE Security Updates · Feb 4, 2026
- openSUSE-SU-2020:0996-1 Security update for google-compute-engine SUSE / openSUSE Security Updates · Feb 4, 2026
References
- https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/guest-oslogin/pull/29
- https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/gl-security/gl-redteam/red-team-tech-notes/-/tree/master/oslogin-privesc-june-2020
- https://cloud.google.com/support/bulletins/#gcp-2020-008
- openSUSE-SU-2020:0996 vendor-advisory
- openSUSE-SU-2020:1014 vendor-advisory