Kubernetes Cloud Clusters Face Cyberattacks via Argo Workflows

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Kubernetes clusters are being attacked via misconfigured Argo Workflows instances, security researchers are warning.
 
Argo Workflows is an open-source, container-native workflow engine for orchestrating parallel jobs on Kubernetes – to speed up processing time for compute-intensive jobs like machine learning and big-data processing. It’s also used to simplify container deployments in general. Kubernetes, meanwhile, is a popular container-orchestration engine for managing cloud deployments.
 
Malware operators are dropping cryptominers into the cloud via Argo thanks to some instances being publicly available via dashboards that don’t require authentication for outside users, according to an analysis from Intezer. These misconfigured permissions thus can allow threat actors to run unauthorized code in the victim’s environment.
 
“In many instances, permissions are configured which allow any visiting user to deploy workflows,” according to the Intezer analysis, published Tuesday. “In instances when permissions are misconfigured, it is possible for an attacker to access an open Argo dashboard and submit their own workflow.”
 
Researchers said the misconfigurations can also expose sensitive information such as code, credentials and private container-image names (which can be used to assist in other kinds of attacks).

Intezer’s scan of the web found scads of unprotected instances, operated by companies in several industries, including technology, finance and logistics.
 
“We have identified infected nodes and there is the potential for larger-scale attacks due to hundreds of misconfigured deployments,” according to Intezer. In one case, bad code was running on an exposed cluster in Docker Hub for nine months before being discovered and removed.

Read more: Kubernetes Cloud Clusters Face Cyberattacks via Argo Workflows | Threatpost