GCP-2024-040
Source GCP Compute Engine Security
Public exploit available (Exploit-DB).
Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 22:14 UTC
Rated High by Threat Radar's AI analysis · CVSS not yet scored by NVD
Exploitation evidence
Disclosed: evidence found.
Public on cve.org; its publication date is not in this record
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: evidence found.
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.
What to do
AI-suggested
Apply official patches from Linux distributions as they become available. For TPUs, update to the specified patched versions (tpu-ubuntu2204-base, v2-alpha-tpuv5, v2-alpha-tpuv5-lite). For Container-Optimized OS, upgrade to one of the listed patched versions. If using managed services like GKE, follow their security bulletins for patching. If patching is not immediately possible, disable OpenSSH or restrict SSH access by disabling the default-allow-ssh firewall rule and limiting SSH access to trusted networks. Additionally, apply the runtime mitigation by setting LoginGraceTime to 0 in sshd_config and restarting sshd to mitigate the race condition exploited by this vulnerability.
Description
A critical vulnerability (CVE-2024-6387) in OpenSSH allows remote unauthenticated attackers to execute arbitrary code as root on affected machines. This affects Compute Engine VMs running glibc-based Linux distributions with OpenSSH exposed, as well as Google TPU and Container-Optimized OS versions. The vulnerability can be mitigated by applying patches from Linux distributions or Google-provided updated OS images. Runtime mitigation is also available by setting LoginGraceTime to 0 in sshd_config and restarting the sshd service. Additionally, restricting SSH access via firewall rules to trusted networks or disabling SSH until patched reduces exposure.