Executive Summary

CVE-2026-33459 is an Uncontrolled Resource Consumption vulnerability (CWE-400) in Kibana versions 8.15.0 through 8.19.13, 9.0.0 through 9.2.7, and 9.3.0 through 9.3.2. It allows an authenticated user with Fleet and Integrations privileges to cause a denial of service by exploiting the automatic import feature.

The attacker submits specially crafted requests containing excessively large input values. When multiple such requests are sent concurrently, the backend services become unstable due to excessive allocation of resources (CAPEC-130), leading to service disruption and unavailability for all users.

This vulnerability affects deployments where the automatic import plugin is enabled, which is the default setting in Kibana 8.15 and later.

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Impact Analysis

This vulnerability can lead to a denial of service (DoS) condition in Kibana deployments by causing backend services to become unstable and unavailable.

• Service disruption and deployment unavailability for all users.
• Indicators of compromise include repeated or concurrent requests with large payloads to automatic import endpoints, high-volume request patterns in audit and HTTP access logs, and HTTP 502 errors signaling resource exhaustion.

The impact is rated as high availability impact with no confidentiality or integrity loss.

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Detection Guidance

This vulnerability can be detected by monitoring for indicators of compromise such as repeated or concurrent requests with large payloads to automatic import endpoints from the same user or session.

You should look for patterns of high-volume requests in Kibana audit and HTTP access logs, as well as HTTP 502 errors which signal resource exhaustion.

Commands to detect this might include searching your logs for large payload requests and HTTP 502 errors related to automatic import endpoints. For example, using grep or similar tools to find large request payloads or error codes in your Kibana logs.

• grep -i 'automatic_import' /var/log/kibana/access.log | grep -E 'POST|PUT' | awk '{print $0}'
• grep '502' /var/log/kibana/error.log
• Analyze audit logs for repeated requests from the same user/session with large payload sizes.

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Mitigation Strategies

Immediate mitigation steps include updating Kibana to a fixed version where the vulnerability is resolved.

• Upgrade to Kibana versions 8.19.14, 9.2.8, or 9.3.3 or later.
• If upgrading immediately is not possible, consider disabling the automatic import plugin temporarily, as the vulnerability affects deployments where this plugin is enabled.
• Monitor and restrict authenticated users with Fleet and Integrations privileges from submitting large or excessive requests to the automatic import feature.

Elastic Cloud Serverless environments have been patched prior to public disclosure, so using such environments or applying similar continuous deployment practices can also help mitigate risk.

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Compliance Impact

The vulnerability causes denial of service by making Kibana backend services unstable and unavailable, impacting service availability.

While the CVE description and resources do not explicitly mention compliance with standards like GDPR or HIPAA, the high availability impact could indirectly affect compliance requirements that mandate continuous service availability and reliability.

There is no indication that confidentiality or integrity of data is affected, which are critical factors in GDPR and HIPAA compliance.

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