---
id: CVE-2026-64676
title: >-
  Kata Containers is an open source implementation of lightweight Virtual
  Machines (VMs) that perform like containers
summary: >-
  Kata Containers is an open source implementation of lightweight Virtual
  Machines (VMs) that perform like containers. In versions prior to 4.0.0, the
  kata-agent is vulnerable to an authorization bypass in confidential-guest
  memory managem…
severity: medium
cvss: 5.7
cvssVector: 'CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:L/A:L'
cwe:
  - CWE-862
published: '2026-08-07'
updated: '2026-09-09'
sourceUpdated: '2026-09-09T21:02:22.660'
source: NVD
sourceUrl: 'https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-64676'
references:
  - url: >-
      https://github.com/kata-containers/kata-containers/security/advisories/GHSA-h8jv-63p2-496x
    label: security-advisories@github.com
tags:
  - nvd
epss: 0.00175
epssPercentile: 0.06203
ingestedAt: '2026-09-09T21:22:45.525Z'
---

## Overview

Kata Containers is an open source implementation of lightweight Virtual Machines (VMs) that perform like containers. In versions prior to 4.0.0, the kata-agent is vulnerable to an authorization bypass in confidential-guest memory management. In Confidential Containers (CoCo) deployments, the kata-agent enforces an OPA/Rego-based AgentPolicy that must authorize every ttRPC API call, forming the security boundary that prevents an untrusted host from directing the confidential guest. Two ttRPC methods introduced with the mem-agent feature are missing this authorization check, so an untrusted host can invoke them unconditionally regardless of the guest's policy configuration. When mem-agent is enabled (off by default), this lets the host tamper with in-guest memory management by forcing swap, aggressive eviction, or compaction, resulting in attacker-controlled availability and performance degradation of the confidential workload entirely outside the agent-policy boundary. The impact does not include memory disclosure or code execution, and severity is bounded by the precondition that mem-agent must be explicitly enabled. This issue is fixed in version 4.0.0.

## Remediation

Refer to the linked advisories for vendor-supplied fixes and affected version ranges.