Description
We have released version 5.24.0 of the Grafana Operator. This patch includes a MEDIUM severity security fix for a path traversal/privilege escalation vulnerability in the Grafana Operator.
### Summary
The Grafana Operator supports loading dashboards & library panels using the jsonnet data templating language. The jsonnet expression is evaluated in the context of the operator manager pod.
### Impact
It is possible for a malicious user who can create Dashboard or LibraryPanel resources for a Grafana instance to obtain the Kubernetes service account token of the Grafana Operator manager.
### Affected versions
All Grafana Operator versions <= 5.23
### Solutions and mitigations
All installations should be upgraded as soon as possible.
As a workaround, the following ValidatingAdmissionPolicy prevent the creation or modification of jsonnet based resources:
apiVersion: admissionregistration.k8s.io/v1
kind: ValidatingAdmissionPolicy
metadata:
name: "prevent-jsonnet-dashboards"
spec:
failurePolicy: Fail
matchConstraints:
resourceRules:
- apiGroups: ["grafana.integreatly.org"]
apiVersions: ["v1beta1"]
operations: ["CREATE", "UPDATE"]
resources: ["grafanadashboards", "grafanalibrarypanels"]
validations:
- expression: "!has(object.spec.jsonnetLib)"
---
apiVersion: admissionregistration.k8s.io/v1
kind: ValidatingAdmissionPolicyBinding
metadata:
name: "prevent-jsonnet-dashboards-clusterwide"
spec:
policyName: "prevent-jsonnet-dashboards"
validationActions: [Deny]
### Acknowledgement
We would like to thank Artem Cherezov for responsibly disclosing the vulnerability.
Affected products
| Vendor | Product | Affected | Fixed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Grafana | Grafana Operator | ≤ 5.23.0 | — |
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.
openSUSE
Security tracker ↗| Release | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| openSUSE Leap 16.0 | govulncheck-vulndb | 0.0.20260723T184607-160000.1.1 | openSUSE-SU-2026:21483-1 |
Affected packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Affected | Fixed | Record |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Go | github.com/grafana/grafana-operator | <= 2.0.0 | — | GHSA-fcw4-wwqm-m8cf |
| Go | github.com/grafana/grafana-operator | all versions | — | GO-2026-5355 |
| Go | github.com/grafana/grafana-operator/v3 | all versions | — | GO-2026-5355 |
| Go | github.com/grafana/grafana-operator/v4 | all versions | — | GO-2026-5355 |
| Go | github.com/grafana/grafana-operator/v5 | < 5.24.0 | 5.24.0 | GHSA-fcw4-wwqm-m8cf |
Advisories 2
- openSUSE-SU-2026:21483-1 Security update for govulncheck-vulndb SUSE / openSUSE Security Updates · Jul 31, 2026
- WID-SEC-2026-1915 Grafana Operator: Schwachstelle ermöglicht Privilegieneskalation BSI CERT-Bund (WID) · Jun 16, 2026
References
- https://grafana.com/security/security-advisories/cve-2026-11769 vendor-advisory