---
id: CVE-2026-49298
title: >-
  A bug in Apache Airflow's KubernetesExecutor caused JWT tokens used by worker
  pods to authenticate against the Execution API to be passed to the worker
  container as command-line arguments visible in the pod spec
summary: >-
  A bug in Apache Airflow's KubernetesExecutor caused JWT tokens used by worker
  pods to authenticate against the Execution API to be passed to the worker
  container as command-line arguments visible in the pod spec. An authenticated
  UI/API …
severity: high
cvss: 8.8
cvssVector: 'CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H'
cwe:
  - CWE-538
vendor: apache
product: airflow
affected:
  - airflow < 3.2.2
patched:
  - airflow 3.2.2
published: '2026-06-01'
updated: '2026-11-03'
sourceUpdated: '2026-11-03T07:20:55.103'
source: NVD
sourceUrl: 'https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-49298'
references:
  - url: 'https://github.com/apache/airflow/pull/60108'
    label: security@apache.org
  - url: 'https://lists.apache.org/thread/wo09vrks8189dzsot39rvrx3vnx102tt'
    label: security@apache.org
  - url: 'https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-49298'
  - url: 'https://github.com/apache/airflow/pull'
tags:
  - nvd
  - cve.org
  - osv
  - pip
ssvc:
  exploitation: none
  automatable: 'no'
  technicalImpact: total
  timestamp: '2026-06-02T15:56:22.010586Z'
epss: 0.00489
epssPercentile: 0.42188
aliases:
  - GHSA-5j6p-jrrm-6x94
  - BIT-airflow-2026-49298
ecosystem: pip
ingestedAt: '2026-07-09T11:56:18.304Z'
---

## Overview

A bug in Apache Airflow's KubernetesExecutor caused JWT tokens used by worker pods to authenticate against the Execution API to be passed to the worker container as command-line arguments visible in the pod spec. An authenticated UI/API user with Kubernetes read-only access to the cluster (e.g. `pods/get` in the Airflow namespace) could harvest the JWT from `kubectl describe pod` output and then call state-mutating Execution API endpoints — triggering Dag runs, clearing runs, reading or writing Variables / Connections / XComs — as if they were a running task. Affects deployments using the `KubernetesExecutor`. Users are advised to upgrade to `apache-airflow` 3.2.2 or later. This is the airflow-core half of the same vulnerability addressed by [CVE-2026-27173](https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-27173), which shipped the apache-airflow-providers-cncf-kubernetes side of the fix. Deployments that already upgraded `apache-airflow-providers-cncf-kubernetes` to 10.17.0 or later per the CVE-2026-27173 advisory should additionally upgrade `apache-airflow` to 3.2.2 or later to close the core-side surface — the two fixes are complementary, not duplicates.

## Affected

- `airflow < 3.2.2`

## Remediation

Upgrade past the affected range:

- `airflow 3.2.2`

## Package advisory (CVE-2026-49298)

Affected packages:

- `apache-airflow-core < 3.2.2`

Patched in:

- `apache-airflow-core 3.2.2`

Source: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/GHSA-5j6p-jrrm-6x94