Quick answers
- Is CVE-2026-42252 exploited in the wild?
- No. Junglewise Threat Intelligence has no report of CVE-2026-42252 being exploited in the wild.
- How severe is CVE-2026-42252?
- Critical severity, with a CVSS score of 9.1, published 1 June 2026.
- Which products and versions are affected?
- Apache Airflow Before 3.2.2; apache-airflow (PyPI) >= 3.0.0, < 3.2.2, ECOSYSTEM:introduced=3.0.0,fixed=3.2.2.
- Is there a fix for CVE-2026-42252?
- Yes. apache-airflow (PyPI): upgrade to 3.2.2 or later. Junglewise finds every place you run it, drafts the upgrade and applies it once you approve.
- How is CVE-2026-42252 attacked?
- It is attacked over the network, in a software library.
- Am I affected by CVE-2026-42252?
- Check whether you run Apache Airflow or apache-airflow (PyPI) at an affected version. Junglewise does that check for you around the clock: connect your code, cloud and domains, and it matches new vulnerabilities like this one against what you actually run and tells you when one reaches you.
How to fix
- apache-airflow (PyPI): upgrade to 3.2.2 or later
pip install "apache-airflow>=3.2.2"
Technical details
The vulnerability stems from an insecure Jinja2 template pattern in the official Apache Airflow documentation for 'Passing Parameters when triggering Dags'. The documentation suggested using BashOperator(bash_command="echo value: {{ dag_run.conf['conf1'] }}") without proper shell quoting or sanitization. An authenticated attacker with 'Dag.can_trigger' permissions can exploit this by providing a malicious payload (e.g., shell metacharacters) in the 'conf' field of a DAG trigger request. This results in arbitrary command execution (RCE) via os.exec on the Airflow worker. The fix involves updating documentation to use explicit shell-quoting and upgrading to version 3.2.2.
Affected products
- Apache Software Foundation Apache Airflow >= 3.0.0, < 3.2.2
Identifiers
- CVE-2026-42252
- GHSA-c85c-g9wv-pph2
- PYSEC-2026-184
Timeline
- 2026-03-24: patched: Documentation fix merged in PR 64129
- 2026-06-01: disclosed: CVE-2026-42252 published
- 2026-06-01: advisory: GHSA-c85c-g9wv-pph2 published