CVE-2026-35639
OpenClaw Gateway: RCE and Privilege Escalation from operator.pairing to operator.admin via device.pair.approve
Severity by source
Trivy's own label is CRITICAL. Rated critical by GHSA.
Description
OpenClaw before 2026.3.22 contains a privilege escalation vulnerability in the device.pair.approve method that allows an operator.pairing approver to approve pending device requests with broader operator scopes than the approver actually holds. Attackers can exploit insufficient scope validation to escalate privileges to operator.admin and achieve remote code execution on the Node infrastructure.
Affected packages and fixed versions
| Source | Package | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|
| npm::GitHub Security Advisory npm | openclaw | 2026.3.22 |
| minimos | openclaw | 2026.4.2-r0 |
References
- https://github.com/openclaw/openclaw
- https://github.com/openclaw/openclaw/commit/630f1479c44f78484dfa21bb407cbe6f171dac87
- https://github.com/openclaw/openclaw/commit/fc2d29ea926f47c428c556e92ec981441228d2a4
- https://github.com/openclaw/openclaw/security/advisories/GHSA-hf68-49fm-59cq
- https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-35639
- https://www.vulncheck.com/advisories/openclaw-privilege-escalation-via-device-pair-approve-scope-validation