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Fencer Vulns
critical 9.8

CVE-2023-3326 json

Network authentication attack via pam_krb5

published 2023-06-22 3 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2023-43994

cvss
9.8
version 3.1, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
1.1%
EPSS 1.1% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 65%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

pam_krb5 authenticates a user by essentially running kinit with the password, getting a ticket-granting ticket (tgt) from the Kerberos KDC (Key Distribution Center) over the network, as a way to verify the password. However, if a keytab is not provisioned on the system, pam_krb5 has no way to validate the response from the KDC, and essentially trusts the tgt provided over the network as being valid. In a non-default FreeBSD installation that leverages pam_krb5 for authentication and does not have a keytab provisioned, an attacker that is able to control both the password and the KDC responses can return a valid tgt, allowing authentication to occur for any user on the system.

Patch / fix

  • FreeBSD FreeBSD 12.4-RELEASE-p3, 13.1-RELEASE-p8, 13.2-RELEASE-p1

CISA SSVC

Exploitation
none
Automatable
yes
Technical impact
total
Assessed
23 mo ago

Exploit prediction

1.10% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 65% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.1 9.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Affected products

  • FreeBSD FreeBSD

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-303 Incorrect Implementation of Authentication Algorithm
  • CWE-287 Improper Authentication

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.