Kata guest escape: runtime-rs guest-root to host-root escape via virtiofs

Summary

Kata Containers is an open source project focusing on a standard implementation of lightweight Virtual Machines (VMs) that perform like containers. Prior to 3.31.0, the runtime-rs standalone virtio-fs path is vulnerable to a guest-root to host-root escape. In this configuration, Kata runs the host virtiofsd as root with --sandbox none --seccomp none, so an attacker with root-equivalent access inside the guest can bypass the guest virtio-fs client entirely by taking over the virtio-fs PCI device and building a virtqueue in userspace to submit raw FUSE requests directly to the host virtiofsd. A crafted FUSE_SYMLINK request whose new symlink name is an absolute host path is honored outside the configured shared directory, allowing guest root to create root-owned symlinks in sensitive host locations such as /etc/cron.d. By pointing such a symlink at a guest-controlled crontab payload reachable through a live runtime process's mount namespace, the attacker causes the host cron daemon to execute that payload as host root, crossing the Kata isolation boundary. This issue is fixed in version 3.31.0.

Timeline

1. Aug 7, 2026, 9:36 PM UTCCVE published
2. Aug 10, 2026, 1:33 PM UTCCISA SSVC assessment

   Exploitation: poc · Automatable: no · Technical impact: total

3. Aug 10, 2026, 1:34 PM UTCRecord last updated

Affected versions

• kata-containers kata-containers

  fixed in 3.31.0

• github.com/kata-containers/kata-containersGo

  fixed in 0.0.0-20260519062212-ffa59ce3aa78

References 1