# CVE-2026-15801: Cri-o: cri-o: insufficient validation during container checkpoint restore

Status: published. Published: 2026-09-21. Updated: 2026-11-04.

A vulnerability was found in CRI-O related to the container checkpoint and restore feature. When CRI-O is configured to restore containers from checkpoint archives, insufficient validation of restore metadata may allow a user with sufficient privileges to perform unintended operations on the host filesystem. Successful exploitation requires that container checkpoint and restore functionality is enabled, which is not the default configuration. An attacker must also be able to trigger restoration of a container from untrusted checkpoint content.

## Remediation

- workaround: Until the relevant CRI-O/OpenShift security updates are available, this issue can be mitigated by implementing one or more of the following measures: 1. Do not enable container checkpoint and restore functionality unless it is explicitly required for your environment. 2. Restrict permissions to create workloads and to access node-level container runtime interfaces to trusted administrators only. 3. Do not restore containers from untrusted or unverified checkpoint sources. (source: CNA: redhat)

## Affected products and versions

- Red Hat / Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4 (cri-o): Version range not reported. Source: CNA: redhat
- Red Hat / Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 5 (cri-o): Version range not reported. Source: CNA: redhat

## Severity and prioritization

- CVSS 3.1: 8 (high); CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H; source: CNA: redhat

- CISA KEV: No listing in collected sources

- EPSS: 0.48% as of 2026-11-04; percentile 41.48%

- SSVC: exploitation none; automatable no; technical impact total; source ADP: CISA-ADP

- Weaknesses: CWE-22

## Exploit evidence

No exploit evidence in collected sources. This is not proof of no exploitation.

## References

- https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-15801 (CNA: redhat; vdb-entry, x_refsource_REDHAT)

- https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2500823 (CNA: redhat; issue-tracking, x_refsource_REDHAT)

## Provenance

- CNA: redhat: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-15801; retrieved 2026-11-04; source updated 2026-11-04

- FIRST EPSS: https://api.first.org/data/v1/epss?cve=CVE-2026-15801; retrieved 2026-11-04; source updated Not reported

Revision: 168e9286e110c353dac10835f7ea2c7b04c744330cb25bd4c940ffd8f97f971e

Canonical: https://y2.dev/cve/CVE-2026-15801

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