CVE-2023-29194: vitess allows users to create keyspaces that can deny access to already existing keyspaces

Severity: low (CVSS 2.7 v3.1)
Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
EPSS: 0.8% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
Public exploit or detection template: none known
Published: 2023-04-14 · updated 2026-06-17
Weakness: CWE-20

Description

Vitess is a database clustering system for horizontal scaling of MySQL. Users can either intentionally or inadvertently create a keyspace containing `/` characters such that from that point on, anyone who tries to view keyspaces from VTAdmin will receive an error. Trying to list all the keyspaces using `vtctldclient GetKeyspaces` will also return an error. Note that all other keyspaces can still be administered using the CLI (vtctldclient). This issue is fixed in version 16.0.1. As a workaround, delete the offending keyspace using a CLI client (vtctldclient).

Affected products

vitessio vitess: before 16.0.1 — fixed in 16.0.1

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: vitessio vitess 16.0.1. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

Get alerted when CVE-2023-29194 or the next vulnerability affects your stack