Skip to content
Fencer Vulns
medium 4.3

CVE-2020-8551 json

Kubernetes kubelet denial of service

published 2020-03-27 6 y ago modified 2026-08-07 3 mo ago also GHSA-qhm4-jxv7-j9pq , GO-2022-0867 , EUVD-2022-1155

cvss
4.3
version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
1.2%
EPSS 1.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 69%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

The Kubelet component in versions 1.15.0-1.15.9, 1.16.0-1.16.6, and 1.17.0-1.17.2 has been found to be vulnerable to a denial of service attack via the kubelet API, including the unauthenticated HTTP read-only API typically served on port 10255, and the authenticated HTTPS API typically served on port 10250.

Patch / fix

  • go k8s.io/kubernetes 1.15.10, 1.16.6, 1.17.2
  • Kubernetes Kubernetes v1.15.10, v1.16.7, v1.17.3
  • kubernetes Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 1.17.4-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2020-8551

  • openshift openshift 4.3 4.3.10-202003300855.git.0.da48c1d.el7
  • openshift openshift 4.3 4.3.10-202003300855.git.0.da48c1d.el8
  • openshift-hyperkube openshift 4.3 4.3.10-202003300855.git.0.da48c1d.el7
  • openshift-hyperkube openshift 4.3 4.3.10-202003300855.git.0.da48c1d.el8

red hat advisories RHSA-2020:1276

  • govulncheck-vulndb openSUSE Tumbleweed 0.0.20250807T150727-1.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2025:15424-1

Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2020-8551 updated cvss 4.3

kubernetes: crafted requests to kubelet API allow for memory exhaustion

  • Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.3 openshift4/ose-hyperkube v4.3.10-202003311925, openshift 4.3.10-202003300855.git.0.da48c1d.el7, openshift 4.3.10-202003300855.git.0.da48c1d.el8, openshift-hyperkube 4.3.10-202003300855.git.0.da48c1d.el7, openshift-hyperkube 4.3.10-202003300855.git.0.da48c1d.el8
    fixed: vendor fix “Prevent unauthenticated or unauthorized access to the Kubelet API” RHSA-2020:1276
  • Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.4 openshift4/ose-cli v4.4.0-202004261927, openshift4/ose-pod v4.4.0-202004261927, openshift4/ose-etcd v4.4.0-202004261927, openshift4/ose-tests v4.4.0-202004261927, openshift4/ose-console v4.4.0-202004261927, openshift4/ose-coredns v4.4.0-202004261927, +76 more
    fixed: vendor fix “Prevent unauthenticated or unauthorized access to the Kubelet API” RHBA-2020:0581
  • Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.5 openshift4/ose-cli v4.5.0-202007012112.p0, openshift4/ose-pod v4.5.0-202007012112.p0, openshift4/ose-etcd v4.5.0-202007012112.p0, openshift4/ose-tests v4.5.0-202007100518.p0, openshift4/ose-coredns v4.5.0-202007012112.p0, openshift4/ose-grafana v4.5.0-202007012112.p0, +71 more
    fixed: vendor fix “Prevent unauthenticated or unauthorized access to the Kubelet API” RHBA-2020:2409
  • Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 3.11 atomic-openshift, atomic-openshift-pod, atomic-openshift-node, atomic-openshift-tests, atomic-openshift-master, atomic-openshift-clients, +7 more Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4 openshift4/ose-hypershift, openshift4/ose-openshift-apiserver-rhel9 Red Hat Storage 3 heketi, heketi-client, python-heketi
    not affected: vulnerable code not present

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

Exploit prediction

1.24% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 69% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
CNA 3.1 4.3 CVSS:3.1/AV:A/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L
NVD 3.1 6.5 CVSS:3.1/AV:A/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
NVD 2.0 3.3 AV:A/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P
GitHub 3.1 4.3 CVSS:3.1/AV:A/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L

Affected packages

ecosystem package affected fixed in
go k8s.io/kubernetes
>=1.15.0, <1.15.10
>=1.16.0, <1.16.6
>=1.17.0, <1.17.2
1.15.10
1.16.6
1.17.2

Affected products

  • Kubernetes Kubernetes

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-789 Memory Allocation with Excessive Size Value
  • CWE-770 Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling
Technology feeds

References

Sources

Fencer Vulns keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.