How to Prevent the Spring Cloud Gateway RCE Vulnerability (CVE‑2022‑22947)

Vulnerability Description

Spring Cloud Gateway, built on the high‑performance Reactor Netty framework, suffers from a remote code execution vulnerability (CVE‑2022‑22947) in its Actuator endpoint. When the endpoint is enabled and exposed, an attacker can inject code and execute arbitrary commands on the host.

The Spring Boot Actuator module, which provides health checks, metrics, and tracing, exposes internal application information via HTTP/JMX; exposing it in production creates the attack surface exploited by this flaw.

Affected Versions

3.1.0

3.0.0 – 3.0.6

Older releases

Mitigation

Do not expose the Actuator endpoint to the internet. Restrict access with a firewall instead of disabling Actuator entirely, which could break internal monitoring.

Upgrade to safe versions: 3.1.x → 3.1.1, 3.0.x → 3.0.7 or later.

# If using nginx to forward, block the endpoint
if ($request_uri ~ "/actuator") {
    return 403;
}

Operational Hardening Recommendations

Install the minimal set of packages; avoid unnecessary software.

Disable unnecessary services from starting at boot.

Use safe command options (e.g., rm -i instead of rm -rf).

Avoid logging in as root; use regular user accounts.

Grant users only the permissions required for their tasks.

Restrict file and directory permissions to prevent arbitrary changes.