Docker Hub: Incorrect privilege assignment in account conversion

Summary

An Incorrect Privilege Assignment flaw in Docker Hub's account-to-organization conversion let an authenticated attacker reassign a personal access token (PAT) they controlled to another Docker Hub user, without rotating or revoking the token secret. The unchanged PAT then authenticated to the registry as the recipient and could pull, push or delete images within its scopes, including in organization repositories accessible to that user. Exploitation requires a Docker Hub account; Docker fixed the issue on 2026-09-30 and reports no evidence of exploitation.

Affected

• Docker Hub (hosted service), affected from 2024-08-26T20:33:00Z to before 2026-09-30T19:10:00Z (per CVE record).
• No customer-side software versions.

Fixed in

• Fixed by Docker on Docker Hub itself on 2026-09-30. No customer update is required.
• Account conversion no longer transfers PATs; the new owner must create new tokens.
• Exact fixed-version identifiers: Unknown.

Workaround

• No customer-side workaround is needed; the fix is server-side.
• Review and revoke personal access tokens you do not actively need, and re-issue those still in use.
• Check the account switcher for organizations you did not join.

Exploitation

• Docker reports no evidence of exploitation in the wild.
• CISA SSVC assessment: exploitation none, automatable no, technical impact total.
• No public proof of concept was found in our research.

Our recommendation

• Check whether any account you own was converted to an organization since August 2024.
• Review and rotate personal access tokens used in CI/CD pipelines and by staff.
• Check Docker Hub activity logs for unexpected pulls, pushes or deletes.
• Pin images by digest and verify digests before deployment.

Public exploits iAttack code is publicly available (PoC on GitHub, Metasploit or Exploit-DB).

Links to third-party sites, not checked by us – exploit code can contain malware. Only use it in isolated test environments.

• Proof of concept on GitHub (1 repositories) iAttack code is publicly available (PoC on GitHub, Metasploit or Exploit-DB).
  CompleteTech-Security/docker-hub-ghostpat-check

Research sources

• Docker Security Advisory CVE-2026-105445 www.docker.com
• Docker documentation: Convert a Docker account to an organization docs.docker.com
• GhostPat research write-up ghostpat.com
• BleepingComputer: Docker Hub flaw let attackers impersonate users www.bleepingcomputer.com
• The Hacker News: Docker fixes critical two-year-old Hub flaw thehackernews.com
• Strix: CVE-2026-105445 www.strix.ai
• daily.dev: Docker Hub security advisory CVE-2026-105445 daily.dev
• Vulners VulnRichment: CVE-2026-105445 vulners.com

Researched and written up in English and German by an AI (Claude by Anthropic) based on NVD, CISA, EPSS and the sources listed. The vendor information is authoritative. Researched on 31 Oct 2026, 00:04.