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A flaw was found in ansible-core.

5.5MediumCNA
Exploited
No known exploitation
Fix
Fixed in 2.23.0
Who is exposed
Not reported

Do first: Upgrade to a fixed version: 2.23.0.

Published
Last modified
22/100 · provisional
None on Exploit-DB, Metasploit or GitHub
  • Exploitation: none
  • Automatable: no
  • Technical impact: partial

Summary

A local attacker with low privileges and no user interaction needed can read secret values that ansible-core should have hidden. A flaw in ansible-core causes failed tasks marked `no_log: true` to still print their exception text, which can include secrets from extra variables or variables files.

Written by anthropic/claude-haiku-5.5 from the sources below. Verify against them.

Read the original description

A flaw was found in ansible-core. When a task marked no_log: true fails, the task result is censored before being emitted, but the exception field is retained because it is present in the PRESERVE allow-list in lib/ansible/_internal/_task.py, and the default stdout callback prints it through CallbackBase._handle_exception. As a result, sensitive values the operator explicitly asked to hide can be disclosed: module argument-validation errors echo the argument value, templating errors print an Origin source snippet (the failing line plus the two preceding lines of the variables file, exposing neighbouring secrets from an -e @secrets.yml file), and fail/assert messages are printed in full. Secret material supplied as extra variables or variables files can therefore leak to terminal output, CI logs, and the stdout logs of any automation wrapping ansible-playbook, even though every task touching the secrets is marked no_log: true. This is a regression introduced with the ansible-core 2.19 data-tagging/templating rework; the behaviour does not occur on 2.16, where the error text is correctly censored.

cve.now Index

22Pcve.now Index 22 of 100 · methodology v3 · provisional
  • Exploitation0/40No signal
  • Exposure?/25Unknown. No advisory context yet
  • Reach16/20ansible-core: 4M downloads a week
  • Severity5.5/10CVSS 5.5
  • No patch0/5No signal

What would change the score

  • Would score about 77 if added to CISA KEV
  • Would score about 72 if CISA's SSVC rates exploitation active
  • Would score about 44 if advisories confirm default setups are exposed

Impact

  • Widely used

    ansible-core has 4m weekly downloads.Source: pypistats.org

    318 packages depend on ansible-core.Source: deps.dev

What to do

  • Upgrade to a fixed version: 2.23.0.

Timeline

  1. CVE published
  2. First seen by cve.now
  3. CISA SSVC assessment

    Exploitation: none · Automatable: no · Technical impact: partial

  4. Record last updated

Affected versions

  • ansible-corePyPI

    From 2.19.0 · fixed in 2.23.0

Evidence 1

  1. Link

Corrections

None so far.

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Questions about CVE-2026-123036

Is CVE-2026-123036 being exploited?

It is not in CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog, and CISA's SSVC assessment does not mark exploitation as active. That does not mean it has not been attacked: vendors and researchers can report attacks before CISA lists them. No public exploit code is tracked.Source: cve.now feed data

Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-123036?

ansible-core (PyPI): from 2.19.0 before 2.23.0.Source: cve.now feed data

How do I fix CVE-2026-123036?

Upgrade to a fixed version: 2.23.0.Source: cve.now feed data