Authenticated administrator escalation via arbitrary API-key binding
Published Sep 4, 2026 · Updated Sep 4, 2026
Privilege escalation in StackStorm st2 3.0 through 3.9.0 allows remote authenticated users to gain administrator access through the API. ApiKeyController.post trusts the request body's user field and checks only the caller's global api_key_create grant, allowing a key to be bound to another account. RBAC must be enabled and the caller must hold api_key_create; the resulting key inherits the impersonated administrator's API permissions.
Summary
What happened
Privilege escalation in StackStorm st2 3.0 through 3.9.0 allows remote authenticated users to gain administrator access through the API. ApiKeyController.post trusts the request body's user field and checks only the caller's global api_key_create grant, allowing a key to be bound to another account. RBAC must be enabled and the caller must hold api_key_create; the resulting key inherits the impersonated administrator's API permissions.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2026-85514
- Published
- Sep 4, 2026
- Updated
- Sep 4, 2026
- Vendor
- StackStorm
- Product
- StackStorm
- Classifications
- CWE-269, CWE-266, T1098
- Attack vector
- network
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Sep 4, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Sep 4, 2026Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
Present is not the same as exploitable
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Is a vulnerable build present?
Compare these published version ranges with your installed build and any vendor patches.
- Affected versionversion=3.0
- Affected versionversion=3.1
- Affected versionversion=3.2
- Affected versionversion=3.3
- Affected versionversion=3.4
- Affected versionversion=3.5
- Affected versionversion=3.6
- Affected versionversion=3.7
- Affected versionversion=3.8
- Affected versionversion=3.9.0
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Published CVSS scores
CVSS describes severity. EPSS estimates exploitation probability.
Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.
Weakness, pattern, technique
Public exploit references
- StackStorm administrator-bound API key proof of conceptfunctional · validated
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Technologies
Your stack
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Your stack
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