GitHub Advisoryadvisory · Go
GHSA-hfvc-g4fc-pqhx opentelemetry-go: BSD kenv command not using absolute path enables PATH hijacking
HIGH
Official page ↗
- Aliases
- CVE-2026-39883
- Ecosystem
- Go
- Packages
- go.opentelemetry.io/otel/sdk
- Severity
- High
- CVSS vector
- CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:H/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:H/VI:H/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
- Weaknesses
- CWE-426
- Reviewed
- 2026-04-08
Affected packages
• Go go.opentelemetry.io/otel/sdk: >= 1.15.0, < 1.43.0 → fixed in 1.43.0
Description
Summary
The fix for GHSA-9h8m-3fm2-qjrq (CVE-2026-24051) changed the Darwin `ioreg` command to use an absolute path but left the BSD `kenv` command using a bare name, allowing the same PATH hijacking attack on BSD and Solaris platforms.
Root Cause
`sdk/resource/host_id.go` line 42:
if result, err := r.execCommand("kenv", "-q", "smbios.system.uuid"); err == nil {
Compare with the fixed Darwin path at line 58:
result, err := r.execCommand("/usr/sbin/ioreg", "-rd1", "-c", "IOPlatformExpertDevice")
The `execCommand` helper at `sdk/resource/host_id_exec.go` uses `exec.Command(name, arg...)` which searches `$PATH` when the command name contains no path separator.
Affected platforms (per build tag in `host_id_bsd.go:4`): DragonFly BSD, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris.
The `kenv` path is reached when `/etc/hostid` does not exist (line 38-40), which is common on FreeBSD systems.
Attack
1. Attacker has local access to a system running a Go application that imports `go.opentelemetry.io/otel/sdk`
2. Attacker places a malicious `kenv` binary earlier in `$PATH`
3. Application initializes OpenTelemetry resource detection at startup
4. `hostIDReaderBSD.read()` calls `exec.Command("kenv", ...)` which resolves to the malicious binary
5. Arbitrary code executes in the context of the application
Same attack vector and impact as CVE-2026-24051.
Suggested Fix
Use the absolute path:
if result, err := r.execCommand("/bin/kenv", "-q", "smbios.system.uuid"); err == nil {
On FreeBSD, `kenv` is located at `/bin/kenv`.
Related
Alias · CVE (1)
- CVE-2026-39883 OpenTelemetry-Go is the Go implementation of OpenTelemetry. vulnerability
Weakness · CWE (1)
- CWE-426 Untrusted Search Path weakness