Auth bypass in Zalando Skipper

CVE-2026-54246

Skipper is an HTTP router and reverse proxy for service composition. Prior to 0.27.13, the routesrv component serves cluster-wide control-plane data without application-layer authentication through /routes, /routes/{zone}, /swarm/redis/shards, and /swarm/valkey/shards. The handlers registered in routesrv/routesrv.go, eskipBytes.ServeHTTP in routesrv/eskipbytes.go, RedisHandler.ServeHTTP in routesrv/redishandler.go, and ValkeyHandler.ServeHTTP in routesrv/valkeyhandler.go only restrict HTTP methods and do not authenticate callers. A compromised or otherwise attacker-controlled pod that can reach routesrv on the Kubernetes cluster network can bypass its namespace-scoped RBAC and read Ingress and RouteGroup backend URLs, filter-chain and OAuth or OIDC path details, and Redis or Valkey shard addresses across namespaces. NetworkPolicy can restrict reachability but does not remove the missing-authentication condition, and the established impact is confidentiality exposure rather than direct integrity or availability loss. This issue is fixed in version 0.27.13.

Vulnerability class: Broken Authentication

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 5.7 (Medium). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:A/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N.

Affected products

Weakness classification (CWE)

References

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2026-54246?
CVE-2026-54246 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Zalando Skipper, classified under Missing Authentication for Critical Function. CVSS score: 5.7/10. Published 2026-09-14.
How severe is CVE-2026-54246?
Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 5.7 out of 10.