CVE-2026-48162: Wazuh: cluster peer can read arbitrary master files and forge offline REST API administrator tokens via DAPI tmp_file path injection in Wazuh manager

Severity: critical (CVSS 9.1 v3.1)
Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
EPSS: 0.7% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
Public exploit or detection template: yes
Published: 2026-08-19 · updated 2026-10-26
Weakness: CWE-73

Description

Wazuh is a free and open source platform used for threat prevention, detection, and response. From 4.0.0 until 4.14.6 and 5.0.0-beta3, DistributedAPI.send_tmp_file() in framework/wazuh/core/cluster/dapi/dapi.py joins an attacker-controlled tmp_file value to WAZUH_PATH without canonicalization or confinement. A cluster peer holding the shared Fernet key can use traversal or an absolute path to make the master return any readable file over the cluster channel. Reading /var/ossec/api/configuration/security/private_key.pem allows the peer to forge administrator REST API tokens offline and then exercise administrative privileges without creating an account. This issue is fixed in versions 4.14.6 and 5.0.0-beta3.

Affected products

wazuh: from 4.0.0 before 4.14.6; 5.0.0-beta1, 5.0.0-beta2 — fixed in 4.14.6

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: wazuh 4.14.6. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

Get alerted when CVE-2026-48162 or the next vulnerability affects your stack