CVE-2023-27488
Envoy gRPC client produces invalid protobuf when an HTTP header with non-UTF8 value is received.
- Published
- Updated
- Reserved
- Assigned by
- GitHub_M
Description
Envoy is an open source edge and service proxy designed for cloud-native applications. Prior to versions 1.26.0, 1.25.3, 1.24.4, 1.23.6, and 1.22.9, escalation of privileges is possible when `failure_mode_allow: true` is configured for `ext_authz` filter. For affected components that are used for logging and/or visibility, requests may not be logged by the receiving service. When Envoy was configured to use ext_authz, ext_proc, tap, ratelimit filters, and grpc access log service and an http header with non-UTF-8 data was received, Envoy would generate an invalid protobuf message and send it to the configured service. The receiving service would typically generate an error when decoding the protobuf message. For ext_authz that was configured with ``failure_mode_allow: true``, the request would have been allowed in this case. For the other services, this could have resulted in other unforeseen errors such as a lack of visibility into requests. As of versions 1.26.0, 1.25.3, 1.24.4, 1.23.6, and 1.22.9, Envoy by default sanitizes the values sent in gRPC service calls to be valid UTF-8, replacing data that is not valid UTF-8 with a `!` character. This behavioral change can be temporarily reverted by setting runtime guard `envoy.reloadable_features.service_sanitize_non_utf8_strings` to false. As a workaround, one may set `failure_mode_allow: false` for `ext_authz`.
Scores
| Scored by | CVSS | Score | Vector |
|---|---|---|---|
| GitHub_MCNA (assigner) | 3.1 | Medium5.4 | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:N |
| NVDNVD · Modified | 3.1 | Critical9.8 | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H |
- EPSS (exploitation in 30 days)
- 0.73% · top 46% of all CVEs (6 Nov 2026)
- CISA SSVC
- Exploitation: none · Automatable: no · Technical impact: partial
The list uses the assigner's score when there is one, then CISA's, then NVD's: Medium 5.4.
Weakness
Affected products
- affected >= 1.25.0, <1.25.3
- affected >= 1.24.0, < 1.24.4
- affected >= 1.23.0, < 1.23.6
- affected < 1.22.9
References (1)
- https://github.com/envoyproxy/envoy/security/advisories/GHSA-9g5w-hqr3-w2ph (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_CONFIRMx_transferred
Sources
The same CVE in the primary databases and aggregators, to check against.
- CVE.org record (opens in a new tab)
- CVE List JSON (GitHub) (opens in a new tab)
- NVD (opens in a new tab)
- FIRST EPSS (opens in a new tab)
- OSV.dev (opens in a new tab)
- GitHub Advisories (opens in a new tab)
- CIRCL Vulnerability-Lookup (opens in a new tab)
Badge for a README or a ticket
[](https://trackcve.app/cve/CVE-2023-27488)Record last updated .