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.
Affected products
| Vendor | Product | Affected | Fixed |
|---|---|---|---|
| — | podman | 1.8.2 – < 5.8.10, 6.0.0 – < 6.2.0 | 5.8.10 |
| Red Hat | Red Hat Hardened Images | — | — |
| Red Hat | Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 | — | — |
| Red Hat | Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 | — | — |
| Red Hat | Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 | — | — |
| Red Hat | Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4 | — | — |
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 26.10 | podman | No fix yet | — |
| Ubuntu 26.04 LTS | podman | No fix yet | — |
Red Hat
Security tracker ↗| Release | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| Red Hat Hardened Images 1 | podman +4 | 5:6.1.4-1.4.hum1 | RHSA-2026:98992 |
Azure Linux
| Release | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| Azure Linux 3 | podman +1 | No fix yet | — |
Advisories 2
- RHSA-2026:98992 Red Hat Security Advisory: Red Hat Hardened Images RPMs Security Update Red Hat Security Advisories (RHSA) · Nov 13, 2026
- WID-SEC-2026-4458 Podman: Schwachstelle ermöglicht Denial of Service BSI CERT-Bund (WID) · Nov 11, 2026
References
- RHSA-2026:98992 vendor-advisory
- https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-121885 vdb-entry
- RHBZ#2566844 issue-tracking
- https://github.com/podman-container-tools/podman/security/advisories/GHSA-55rm-rwr7-q2wr