CVE-2019-5021
This vulnerability appears to be the result of a regression introduced in December of 2015.
Does this matter?
High impact if exploited, but EPSS currently rates exploitation as unlikely (6.26%). Schedule it in the normal patch cycle and watch for a rise in EPSS or a public exploit.
Description
Versions of the Official Alpine Linux Docker images (since v3.3) contain a NULL password for the `root` user. This vulnerability appears to be the result of a regression introduced in December of 2015. Due to the nature of this issue, systems deployed using affected versions of the Alpine Linux container which utilize Linux PAM, or some other mechanism which uses the system shadow file as an authentication database, may accept a NULL password for the `root` user.
- CVSS 3.1
- 9.8 CRITICALCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
- EPSS
- 6.26% probability · 94th percentile
- Public exploits
- None in Exploit-DB
- CISA KEV
- Not listed
- Weakness
- CWE-258
- Affected
- gliderlabs/docker-alpine · opensuse/leap · f5/big-ip controller
- Source
- talos-cna@cisco.com
EPSS 6.3% since 26 October 2026; no change recorded yet. The dashed line is the ten per cent mark our analysts treat as “patch before the next change window”. Points are recorded when the score first appears and whenever it moves by a percentage point or more.
References
- http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2019-06/msg00004.htmlMailing List, Third Party Advisory
- http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/108288Broken Link
- https://alpinelinux.org/posts/Docker-image-vulnerability-CVE-2019-5021.htmlVendor Advisory
- https://security.netapp.com/advisory/ntap-20190510-0001/Third Party Advisory
- https://support.f5.com/csp/article/K25551452Third Party Advisory
- https://talosintelligence.com/vulnerability_reports/TALOS-2019-0782Exploit, Mitigation, Patch, Third Party Advisory
- http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2019-06/msg00004.htmlMailing List, Third Party Advisory
- http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/108288Broken Link
- https://alpinelinux.org/posts/Docker-image-vulnerability-CVE-2019-5021.htmlVendor Advisory
- https://security.netapp.com/advisory/ntap-20190510-0001/Third Party Advisory
- https://support.f5.com/csp/article/K25551452Third Party Advisory
- https://talosintelligence.com/vulnerability_reports/TALOS-2019-0782Exploit, Mitigation, Patch, Third Party Advisory
Source: NVD record, EPSS from FIRST.org, KEV from CISA, exploits from Exploit-DB. Refreshed daily. Download this record as JSON.