An access control vulnerability was discovered in Grafana OSS where an Organization administrator could permanently delete the Server administrator account. This vulnerability exists in the DELETE /api/org/users/ endpoint.
The vulnerability can be exploited when:
An Organization administrator exists
The Server administrator is either:
Organization administrators can permanently delete Server administrator accounts
If the only Server administrator is deleted, the Grafana instance becomes unmanageable
No super-user permissions remain in the system
Affects all users, organizations, and teams managed in the instance
The vulnerability is particularly serious as it can lead to a complete loss of administrative control over the Grafana instance.
The product does not restrict or incorrectly restricts access to a resource from an unauthorized actor.
Access control involves the use of several protection mechanisms such as:
When any mechanism is not applied or otherwise fails, attackers can compromise the security of the product by gaining privileges, reading sensitive information, executing commands, evading detection, etc. There are two distinct behaviors that can introduce access control weaknesses: