Severity: important
Affected versions:
- Apache Kafka 2.0.0 through 3.3.2
Description:
In CVE-2023-25194, we announced the RCE/Denial of service attack via SASL JAAS
JndiLoginModule configuration in Kafka Connect API. But not only Kafka Connect
API is vulnerable to this attack, the Apache Kafka brokers also have this
vulnerability. To exploit this vulnerability, the attacker needs to be able to
connect to the Kafka cluster and have the AlterConfigs permission on the
cluster resource.
Since Apache Kafka 3.4.0, we have added a system property
("-Dorg.apache.kafka.disallowed.login.modules") to disable the problematic
login modules usage in SASL JAAS configuration. Also by default
"com.sun.security.auth.module.JndiLoginModule" is disabled in Apache Kafka
3.4.0, and
"com.sun.security.auth.module.JndiLoginModule,com.sun.security.auth.module.LdapLoginModule"
is disabled by default in in Apache Kafka 3.9.1/4.0.0
Credit:
Ziyang Li (finder)
Ji'an Zhou (finder)
Ying Zhu (finder)
References:
https://kafka.apache.org/
https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2025-27819
