OpenChoreo: Authenticated OS command injection via OpenChoreo Workflow Plane templates enables code execution in privileged pods (CVE-2026-73667)

OpenChoreo Workflow Plane templates allowed OS command injection because some developer-controlled workflow parameters were directly interpolated into shell scripts executed via sh -c. Authenticated users with permission to configure and trigger workflows could supply crafted parameters containing shell metacharacters, resulting in arbitrary command execution inside workflow pods. Some affected templates ran privileged Podman containers without user namespace isolation, mapping container root (UID 0) to host root, increasing impact risk. The fix involves treating parameters as data passed through container environment variables and enabling pod user namespaces to map container root to non-root host UIDs. Privileged execution was removed where unnecessary. The vulnerability affects versions prior to 1.0.4, versions from 1.1.0 up to but not including 1.1.4, and versions from 1.2.0-rc.1 up to but not including 1.2.0-rc.2.

An authenticated user with permission to trigger affected workflows can execute arbitrary commands inside the workflow pod. This can lead to reading source code, Git and registry credentials, Kubernetes service account tokens, and other mounted secrets or volumes. Privileged Podman containers without user namespace isolation run as root on the host, increasing the risk of container escape or node compromise depending on environment specifics. While not every exploitation leads to full host compromise, the vulnerability substantially raises the potential impact due to elevated privileges and host UID mapping.

A fix is available in OpenChoreo versions 1.0.4, 1.1.4, and 1.2.0-rc.2 that prevents OS command injection by passing parameters as environment variables and enabling pod user namespaces for privileged containers. Users should upgrade to these versions and apply corrected workflow templates from the corresponding release branches. Custom workflow templates should be reviewed and updated to remove unsafe shell interpolation, as upgrading OpenChoreo does not automatically fix custom templates. If immediate upgrade is not possible, restrict workflow creation, modification, and triggering permissions to trusted users only and do not allow untrusted users to control parameters used by checkout, build, publish, or workload-generation templates.