VulnerabilityPublished 22 Sep 2022Updated 27 May 2025

CVE-2022-40186: HashiCorp Vault · Insecure Direct Object Reference

Source CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 9.1 Critical · fixed in 1.11.3 : patch affected systems as a priority.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 13:47 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score

9.1Critical

How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.

EPSS: 1.0% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 62% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.
Patch: Available – fixed in 1.11.3

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N

Attack Vector: Network
Attack Complexity: Low
Privileges Required: None
User Interaction: None
Scope: Unchanged
Confidentiality: High
Integrity: High
Availability: None

Bold values are the worst case: easiest to exploit or largest impact.

Attack Vector: Network: The vulnerable component is bound to the network stack and the set of possible attackers extends beyond the other options listed, up to and including the entire Internet. Such a vulnerability is often termed 'remotely exploitable' and can be thought of as an attack being exploitable at the protocol level one or more network hops away (e.g., across one or more routers).
Attack Complexity: Low: Specialized access conditions or extenuating circumstances do not exist. An attacker can expect repeatable success against the vulnerable component.
Privileges Required: None: The attacker is unauthorized prior to attack, and therefore does not require any access to settings or files to carry out an attack.
User Interaction: None: The vulnerable system can be exploited without any interaction from any user.
Scope: Unchanged: An exploited vulnerability can only affect resources managed by the same security authority. In this case, the vulnerable component and the impacted component are either the same, or both are managed by the same security authority.
Confidentiality: High: There is total loss of confidentiality, resulting in all resources within the impacted component being divulged to the attacker. Alternatively, access to only some restricted information is obtained, but the disclosed information presents a direct, serious impact.
Integrity: High: There is a total loss of integrity, or a complete loss of protection. For example, the attacker is able to modify any/all files protected by the impacted component. Alternatively, only some files can be modified, but malicious modification would present a direct, serious consequence to the impacted component.
Availability: None: There is no impact to availability within the impacted component.

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v3.1 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 22 Sep 2022
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by Mirage: no evidence on record.
No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 26 Oct 2026.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, or CISA SSVC or the CVSS exploit maturity reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

What to do

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
n/a n/a	Affected <1.11.3	Fixed in 1.11.3

AI-suggested

Organizations should prioritize upgrading HashiCorp Vault and Vault Enterprise to version 1.11.3 or later, where this vulnerability has been addressed. Until patching is possible, administrators should audit their Vault deployments for entities with multiple mount accessors sharing alias names and consider restructuring these to avoid alias name collisions. Implement strict access controls and monitoring on Vault audit logs to detect unusual access patterns or metadata changes. Employ network segmentation and firewall rules to restrict access to Vault instances to trusted hosts and networks only. Additionally, review and tighten identity and alias management policies to minimize complexity and reduce the risk of alias misassignment. Regularly validate the integrity of metadata associated with entities and aliases. Finally, incorporate Vault security into incident response plans to quickly respond to any suspected exploitation attempts.

Description

An issue was discovered in HashiCorp Vault and Vault Enterprise before 1.11.3. A vulnerability in the Identity Engine was found where, in a deployment where an entity has multiple mount accessors with shared alias names, Vault may overwrite metadata to the wrong alias due to an issue with checking the proper alias assigned to an entity. This may allow for unintended access to key/value paths using that metadata in Vault.

Impact

For European organizations, the impact of CVE-2022-40186 can be severe due to the widespread adoption of HashiCorp Vault as a secrets management solution in cloud-native and enterprise environments. Unauthorized access to key/value paths could lead to exposure of critical credentials, API keys, certificates, and other sensitive data, potentially enabling further lateral movement, data breaches, or compromise of critical infrastructure. Given the criticality of Vault in securing secrets for applications, infrastructure, and DevOps pipelines, exploitation could disrupt business operations and violate data protection regulations such as GDPR if personal or sensitive data is exposed. The lack of required authentication and user interaction increases the risk of automated or remote exploitation by threat actors. European organizations operating in regulated sectors such as finance, healthcare, and government are particularly at risk due to the sensitivity of the data protected by Vault. Additionally, the vulnerability could undermine trust in identity and access management controls, complicating compliance and audit efforts.

CWE-639Authorization Bypass Through User-Controlled Key (opens in a new tab)
Base weaknessLikelihood of exploit: HighCWE Top 25 (2025): #24OWASP Top 10 A01:2025: Broken Access Control (opens in a new tab)
The system's authorization functionality does not prevent one user from gaining access to another user's data or record by modifying the key value identifying the data.
Architecture and Design
For each and every data access, ensure that the user has sufficient privilege to access the record that is being requested.
Architecture and Design · Implementation
Make sure that the key that is used in the lookup of a specific user's record is not controllable externally by the user or that any tampering can be detected.
Architecture and Design
Use encryption in order to make it more difficult to guess other legitimate values of the key or associate a digital signature with the key so that the server can verify that there has been no tampering.
OWASP Cheat Sheets
Access Control (opens in a new tab)
Authorization Testing Automation (opens in a new tab)
Cross-Site Request Forgery Prevention (opens in a new tab)
Insecure Direct Object Reference Prevention (opens in a new tab)
Authorization (opens in a new tab)
OWASP ASVS 4.0.3
V4.1.2 (opens in a new tab)
V4.2.1 (opens in a new tab)
V8.3.8 (opens in a new tab)
From MITRE CWE, MITRE CAPEC and OWASP (Top 10, OpenCRE).

References

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 6 Jul 2025, 02:55 UTC

WeaknessesCWE-639

Technical details

References

Community reviews

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