CVE-2026-39350

Istio AuthorizationPolicy Incorrect Regex Matching of Dots in serviceAccounts Fields Allows Policy Bypass

Published Apr 15, 2026 CVSS 3.1 · 5.4 Medium EPSS < 1% KEV · Not listed
Description
Istio is an open platform to connect, manage, and secure microservices. In versions 1.25.0 through 1.27.8, 1.28.0 through 1.28.5, 1.29.0, and 1.29.1, the serviceAccounts and notServiceAccounts fields in AuthorizationPolicy incorrectly interpret dots (.) as a regular expression matcher. Because . is a valid character in a service account name, an AuthorizationPolicy ALLOW rule targeting a service account such as cert-manager.io also matches cert-manager-io, cert-managerXio, etc. A DENY rule targeting the same name fails to block those variants. Fixes are available in versions 1.29.2, 1.28.6, and 1.27.9.

Remediation

No solution or workaround provided in the CVE record

Tracking

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Advisories

Source ID Title
Github GHSA Github GHSA GHSA-9gcg-w975-3rjh Istio: AuthorizationPolicy serviceAccounts regex injection via unescaped dots
History
Type Values Removed Values Added
CPEs cpe:2.3:a:istio:istio:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
Type Values Removed Values Added
Metrics ssvc

{'options': {'Automatable': 'no', 'Exploitation': 'none', 'Technical Impact': 'partial'}, 'version': '2.0.3'}

Type Values Removed Values Added
First Time appeared Istio
Istio istio
Vendors & Products Istio
Istio istio
Type Values Removed Values Added
Description Istio is an open platform to connect, manage, and secure microservices. In versions 1.25.0 through 1.27.8, 1.28.0 through 1.28.5, 1.29.0, and 1.29.1, the serviceAccounts and notServiceAccounts fields in AuthorizationPolicy incorrectly interpret dots (.) as a regular expression matcher. Because . is a valid character in a service account name, an AuthorizationPolicy ALLOW rule targeting a service account such as cert-manager.io also matches cert-manager-io, cert-managerXio, etc. A DENY rule targeting the same name fails to block those variants. Fixes are available in versions 1.29.2, 1.28.6, and 1.27.9.
Title Istio AuthorizationPolicy Incorrect Regex Matching of Dots in serviceAccounts Fields Allows Policy Bypass
Weaknesses CWE-185
CWE-863
References
Metrics cvssV3_1

{'score': 5.4, 'vector': 'CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:N'}

Weaknesses

Sources

Status
PUBLISHED
Assigner
GitHub_M
Published
Updated
Apr 16, 2026, 12:04 PM
Reserved
Apr 6, 2026, 8:28 PM
Status
Analyzed
Published
Apr 15, 2026, 11:16 PM
Modified
Jun 17, 2026, 10:41 AM
Severity
Moderate
Public date
Apr 15, 2026, 10:42 PM