CVE-2026-49092 in Kibana
Summary
by MITRE • 07/21/2026
Unintended Proxy or Intermediary ('Confused Deputy') (CWE-441) in Kibana can lead to unauthorized information exposure via Accessing Functionality Not Properly Constrained by ACLs (CAPEC-1). Under certain conditions, a lower-privileged user can cause data from sources they are not authorized to access to be processed using another user's privileges.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 07/21/2026
The vulnerability described represents a sophisticated confused deputy problem that exploits the trust relationships within Kibana's architecture to enable unauthorized data access through privilege escalation. This issue manifests as CWE-441, where an application incorrectly routes requests through trusted intermediaries, allowing attackers to manipulate the flow of operations and exploit legitimate access paths for malicious purposes. The vulnerability specifically targets Kibana's proxy or intermediary functionality, creating a scenario where lower-privileged users can leverage legitimate system components to execute unauthorized operations against restricted data sources.
The technical flaw occurs when Kibana processes requests through intermediaries that fail to properly validate the originating user context or authorization levels. This misconfiguration allows a malicious actor with limited privileges to craft requests that appear to originate from higher-privileged users, effectively bypassing access control mechanisms and ACL constraints. The system's trust in these intermediaries creates an attack vector where legitimate proxy functionality becomes weaponized for unauthorized data exposure.
From an operational impact perspective, this vulnerability enables significant information disclosure risks as attackers can access data sources that should be restricted to specific user roles or groups. The exploitation typically involves crafting requests that leverage the proxy's legitimate access privileges to process data from unauthorized sources, potentially exposing sensitive information through the compromised intermediary channels. This creates a persistent threat vector where the attack surface expands beyond normal ACL boundaries.
The vulnerability aligns with CAPEC-1 patterns of accessing functionality not properly constrained by ACLs, representing a classic case of privilege confusion where system components fail to maintain proper isolation between different user contexts. Attackers can exploit this through various means including request manipulation, session hijacking, or by leveraging legitimate administrative functions that should be restricted to authorized personnel only.
Mitigation strategies should focus on implementing strict validation of all proxy requests and ensuring that intermediaries properly authenticate and authorize each request based on the actual originating user context rather than relying on potentially manipulated trust relationships. Organizations should enforce principle of least privilege for all proxy components, implement comprehensive logging and monitoring of proxy operations, and conduct regular security assessments to identify and remediate similar trust relationship vulnerabilities. The solution requires strengthening ACL enforcement mechanisms and ensuring that all intermediaries maintain proper user context validation throughout the request processing lifecycle.
This vulnerability type falls under the broader category of access control bypasses and represents a significant concern for organizations relying on complex proxy architectures. The threat model suggests that this issue could be exploited by both internal users with limited privileges and external attackers who gain initial access through other vectors, making it particularly dangerous in environments where data segregation is critical. Security teams should implement network segmentation controls and monitor for unusual proxy usage patterns that might indicate exploitation attempts.
The remediation approach must address the root cause by ensuring proper user context handling within Kibana's proxy components, implementing robust input validation for all intermediary requests, and establishing clear boundaries between different privilege levels in the system architecture. This includes configuring proper authentication checks at each hop in the proxy chain and maintaining detailed audit trails of all access operations to facilitate incident response and forensic analysis when such vulnerabilities are exploited.