Bug 2442277 (CVE-2026-3121)

Summary: CVE-2026-3121 keycloak: org.keycloak/keycloak-services: Keycloak: Privilege escalation via manage-clients permission
Product: [Other] Security Response Reporter: OSIDB Bzimport <bzimport>
Component: vulnerabilityAssignee: Product Security DevOps Team <prodsec-dev>
Status: NEW --- QA Contact:
Severity: medium Docs Contact:
Priority: medium    
Version: unspecifiedCC: aschwart, asoldano, bbaranow, bmaxwell, boliveir, brian.stansberry, darran.lofthouse, dosoudil, fjuma, istudens, ivassile, iweiss, mosmerov, mposolda, msvehla, nwallace, pberan, pesilva, pjindal, pmackay, rmartinc, rstancel, smaestri, ssilvert, sthorger, tom.jenkinson, vmuzikar
Target Milestone: ---Keywords: Security
Target Release: ---   
Hardware: All   
OS: Linux   
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A flaw was found in Keycloak. An administrator with `manage-clients` permission can exploit a misconfiguration where this permission is equivalent to `manage-permissions`. This allows the administrator to escalate privileges and gain control over roles, users, or other administrative functions within the realm. This privilege escalation can occur when admin permissions are enabled at the realm level.
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oVirt Team: --- RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host:
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Description OSIDB Bzimport 2026-02-24 13:09:20 UTC 
An admin with manage-clients permission, has always access to manage permissions via the permissions client and, therefore, can escalate privileges to assign to him or other admins permissions to manage roles, users or whatever. Right now `manage-clients` is exactly the same than manage-permissions.
Requirements to exploit: The attacker should be a `manage-clients` administrator in keycloak and the realm should be configure with admin permissions (enabled at realm level).
Reproducer
In a keycloak realm enable admin permissions in Realm Settings -> General.

Create an admin user and grant to him manage, view and list clients.