Profile applicability: Level 1
The RBAC role
cluster-admin
provides wide-ranging powers over the environment and should be used only where and
when needed.Kubernetes provides a set of default roles where RBAC is used. Some of these roles
such as
cluster-admin
provide wide-ranging privileges which should only be applied where absolutely necessary.
Roles such as cluster-admin
allow super-user access to perform any action on any resource. When used in a ClusterRoleBinding
, it gives full control over every resource in the cluster and in all namespaces.
When used in a RoleBinding
, it gives full control over every resource in the rolebinding's namespace, including
the namespace itself.![]() |
NoteBy default, a single
clusterrolebinding called cluster-admin is provided with the system:masters group as its principal. |
Impact
Care should be taken before removing any
clusterrolebindings
from the environment to ensure they were not required for operation of the cluster.
Specifically, modifications should not be made to clusterrolebindings
with the system:
prefix as they are required for the operation of system components.Audit
Obtain a list of the principals who have access to the
cluster-admin
role by reviewing the clusterrolebinding
output for each role binding that has access to the cluster-admin
role.kubectl get clusterrolebindings -o=custom- columns=NAME:.metadata.name,ROLE:.roleRef.name,SUBJECT:.subjects[*].name
Review each principal listed and ensure that
cluster-admin
privilege is required for it.Remediation
Identify all
clusterrolebindings
to the cluster-admin
role. Check if they are used and if they need this role or if they could use a role
with fewer privileges.Where possible, first bind users to a lower privileged role and then remove the
clusterrolebinding
to the cluster-admin
role:kubectl delete clusterrolebinding [name]