etcd (TCP/2379)
Gleaming the Kube(rnetes)
TLDR
- WHAT IT IS: Another distributed key-value store that provides a reliable way to store data that needs to be accessed by a distributed system or cluster of machines.
- HOW MANY: 2,560 discovered nodes. 2,560 (100%) have version fingerprints
- VULNERABILITIES: Two low-to-moderate CVEs since 2018.
- ADVICE: Use it! Just don’t expose it to the internet.
- ALTERNATIVES: Redis and memcached are two similar, alternative in-memory key-value stores with characteristics similar to etcd.
The etcd key-value service is part of the Kubernetes ecosystem and is designed to hold system/service configuration and state information. The Kubernetes API Server uses etcd's watch API to monitor the cluster and roll out critical configuration changes or simply restore any divergences of the state of the cluster back to what was declared by the deployer. It exposes a JSON API over the HTTP protocol.
We’re including etcd for completeness (since we’ve mentioned in the previous blogs on Redis and memcached), but the sample size is way too small to dig into, since we have no data on which ones are honeypots and which ones are real.
Just like the other two key-value databases, etcd should never be exposed to the internet. Unlike the previous two services, etcd tends to be purpose-driven for Kubernetes orchestration environments, which is another great reason not to expose it to the internet directly.
Links:
- https://www.rapid7.com/blog/post/2020/12/10/nicer-protocol-deep-dive-internet-exposure-of-etcd/