Answer in brief
CVE-2026-57231 records a High severity (CVSS 7.5) vulnerability in Podman: Malformed Image can trick podman run into leaking host environment variables into the container. The current sources do not mark it as known exploited. The current feed maps github.com/containers/podman (go), github.com/containers/podman (go), github.com/containers/podman/v2 (go), github.com/containers/podman/v2 (go) and additional mapped packages. Check affected ranges and fixed versions before updating.
Analysis pending evidence review
HOL Guard separates source facts from reviewed analysis. See the methodology.
CVSS is 7.5. The current sources do not mark it as known exploited. Treat this as a source-backed prioritization signal, not a statement about your environment.
Analysis status
Analysis pending evidence review
Factual feed record only; HOL analysis is not approved for indexing. Read the methodology.
The current feed maps github.com/containers/podman (go), github.com/containers/podman (go), github.com/containers/podman/v2 (go), github.com/containers/podman/v2 (go) and additional mapped packages. Check affected ranges and fixed versions before updating.
| Package | Affected range | Fixed version |
|---|---|---|
| github.com/containers/podmango | >=1.8.1,<5.8.4 | Not reported |
| github.com/containers/podmango | >=1.8.1 | Not reported |
| github.com/containers/podman/v2go | <=2.2.1 | Not reported |
| github.com/containers/podman/v2go | >=0 | Not reported |
| github.com/containers/podman/v3go | <=3.4.7 | Not reported |
| github.com/containers/podman/v3go | >=0 | Not reported |
| github.com/containers/podman/v4go | <=4.9.5 | Not reported |
| github.com/containers/podman/v4go | >=0 | Not reported |
| github.com/containers/podman/v5go | <5.8.4 | 5.8.4 |
| github.com/containers/podman/v5go | >=0 <5.8.4 | 5.8.4 |
| go.podman.io/podman/v6go | <6.0.0 | 6.0.0 |
| go.podman.io/podman/v6go | >=0 <6.0.0 | 6.0.0 |
Published upstream
Jun 26, 2026
Evidence: source:ghsa:source_dates:source-dates:recordSource modified
Sep 24, 2026
Evidence: source:ghsa:source_dates:source-dates:recordFirst seen by HOL
Jun 26, 2026
## Summary An container image that contains a environment variable with just a key and no value can trick podman into passing that variable from the host into the container. This is made worse by the fact that using an asterisk (*) will cause podman to pass all host variables into the container. So essentially a malicious image can exfiltrate all podman environment variables that are set in the session from where the container is launched. ## Details podman run allows `--env VAR1` or `--env VAR*` which will read the variable values from the current environment and then passes them into the container. However because the same parsing logic was reused for the image config env section that means that an image variable could also gain access to that. ## Patch That image spec requires the env variables to be in the form of `key=value`, so to address this invalid formatted variables get rejected and the container will not run. Fixed in https://github.com/podman-container-tools/podman/commit/6c431b73dbf8e4b20b778644d7a80caebdb75050 ## Workaround Do not run untrusted images. Before running an image consider inspecting the config with `podman image inspect --format '{{.Config.Env}}' <image>` and check for any variables that do not have a value assigned.
Quoted source text, attributed separately from HOL analysis.