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CVE-2026-52855 Elastic Security · Elastic

Detect Pterodactyl Wings Egg Configuration-File Templating Node Secret Exposure (CVE-2026-52855) in Elastic Security

Detects exploitation of CVE-2026-52855, a critical (CVSS 9.9) information disclosure vulnerability in Pterodactyl Wings prior to 1.12.3. The Wings daemon's egg configuration-file templating engine fails to properly scope variable substitution, allowing a malicious or crafted egg/server configuration to reference and render node-level secrets (e.g., the Wings daemon token, SFTP credentials, Docker/panel authentication secrets) into server-accessible configuration files. An attacker with the ability to create or modify an egg (via panel admin compromise, supply-chain egg import, or a malicious server owner in multi-tenant environments) can exfiltrate node configuration secrets, leading to full node takeover. Detection focuses on Wings daemon logs showing configuration-file template rendering events that reference sensitive node config keys, unexpected egg install/import activity, and outbound access to rendered server config files containing daemon secrets.

MITRE ATT&CK

Tactic
Collection Credential Access Privilege Escalation

Elastic Detection Query

Elastic Security (Elastic)
eql
any where event.dataset == "wings.daemon" and
  (message like "*config-file*" or message like "*egg*template*") and
  (message like "*config.token*" or message like "*daemon_token*" or message like "*docker.socket*" or message like "*sftp.password*" or message like "*authentication_token*" or message like "*panel_secret*")
critical severity medium confidence

Detects Wings daemon log events indicating egg config-file templates rendered node secret keys, matching CVE-2026-52855 exploitation behavior.

Data Sources

Application logs (Wings daemon, forwarded via Filebeat/Elastic Agent)

Required Tables

logs-wings.daemon-*

False Positives & Tuning

  • Legitimate developer debugging of egg templates on non-production nodes
  • QA automation rendering configs with debug-level logging

Other platforms for CVE-2026-52855


Testing Methodology

Validate this detection against 3 adversary techniques from Atomic Red Team. Each test below lists the behaviour to exercise and the telemetry you should expect to see. Executable commands and cleanup steps are available with Pro.

  1. Test 1Simulate malicious egg config_files template referencing secret key

    Expected signal: Wings daemon logs recording config-file template rendering for the test egg, including reference to the config.token variable

  2. Test 2Render server config and inspect for exposed daemon secret

    Expected signal: File write event on server.properties under the server volume, plus Wings daemon log entry for config sync of the test server

  3. Test 3Verify unpatched Wings version is vulnerable

    Expected signal: Command execution log/audit entry for the wings version check on the lab host

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