Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform websocket event consumer consumer_access improper authorization

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability labeled as problematic has been found in Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform. This affects the function consumer_access of the component websocket event consumer. Such manipulation leads to improper authorization. This vulnerability is referenced as CVE-2026-16544. It is possible to launch the attack remotely. No exploit is available.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability was found in Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform (the affected version unknown) and classified as problematic. Affected by this issue is the function consumer_access of the component websocket event consumer. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a improper authorization vulnerability. Using CWE to declare the problem leads to CWE-285. The product does not perform or incorrectly performs an authorization check when an actor attempts to access a resource or perform an action. Impacted is confidentiality. CVE summarizes:

A flaw was found in AWX. The websocket event consumer performs RBAC authorization checks only for event groups that are mapped in the consumer_access() function (job_events, workflow_events, ad_hoc_command_events). Three event groups - inventory_update_events, project_update_events, and system_job_events — are not mapped, causing the authorization check to be skipped. Any authenticated user can subscribe to these unmapped websocket event groups for any object ID and receive real-time stdout output from jobs belonging to organizations they have no access to. This is an incomplete remediation of CVE-2020-10698.

The advisory is shared for download at access.redhat.com. This vulnerability is handled as CVE-2026-16544 since 07/22/2026. The exploitation is known to be easy. The attack may be launched remotely. There are known technical details, but no exploit is available. The current price for an exploit might be approx. USD $5k-$25k (estimation calculated on 07/22/2026). The MITRE ATT&CK project declares the attack technique as T1548.002.

There is no information about possible countermeasures known. It may be suggested to replace the affected object with an alternative product.

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Productinfo

Type

• Automation Software

Vendor

• Red Hat

Name

• Ansible Automation Platform

License

• open-source

Website

• Vendor: https://www.redhat.com/

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