Security Bulletin
Summary
IBM Sterling Partner Engagement Manager's JWT secret is stored in public Helm Charts and is not stored as a Kubernetes secret. This issue has been addressed in the latest Helm Chart.
Vulnerability Details
CVEID: CVE-2025-33093
DESCRIPTION: IBM Sterling Partner Engagement Manager's JWT secret is stored in public Helm Charts and is not stored as a Kubernetes secret.
CWE: CWE-260: Password in Configuration File
CVSS Source: IBM
CVSS Base score: 7.5
CVSS Vector: (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N)
Affected Products and Versions
| Affected Product(s) | Version(s) |
| PEM | 6.1.x |
| PEM | 6.2.x |
Remediation/Fixes
| Product | Version(s) | Remediation/Fix/Instructions |
| IBM Sterling Partner Engagement Manager Standard Edition / Essentials Edition | 6.1.x, 6.2.0,6.2.3, 6.24 | 6.2.0,6.2.3,6.2.4 |
Workarounds and Mitigations
Behavioural Change
As part of recent changes to the Helm chart configuration, the default values for the JWT secrets in the following fields — communitymanager.nonprod/prod.setupfile.jwt.secretkey and communitymanager.nonprod/prod.setupfile.saml.jwt.secretkey — have been removed.
These properties are now mandatory: a valid, non-empty secret key must be provided by the user during deployment.
This change ensures that deployments eliminate the use of weak or hardcoded defaults. If the JWT secret is not provided, the Helm chart will raise an error and halt the installation or upgrade process.
Guidance on generating the secret property
The JWT secret is a random string of characters used to sign and verify JSON Web Tokens (JWTs). When setting your own JWT secret, follow best practices for secure key generation, such as using a long, random, and complex string. Guidance on encryption best practices is available,
https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/spems/6.2.2?topic=security-encryption
You can also generate a strong random secret using the openssl command.
To generate a strong, random 32-byte secret key suitable for JWT signing, use:
openssl rand -base64 32
Then plug this secret into the values.yaml file in the Helm Chart.
Error Encountered When a Value Is Not Provided for the Required Property
If the required JWT secret key is not provided in the values.yaml file during a Helm install or upgrade, the following error will be displayed:
Error:
INSTALLATION FAILED: execution error at (ibm-pem-standard-prod/templates/nonprodpcmconfigmap.yaml:88:20): communitymanager.nonprod.setupfile.jwt.secretkey is required in values.yaml
helm.go:86: 2025-04-15 11:59:47.464714855 +0000 UTC m=+0.134931959 [debug] execution error at (ibm-pem-standard-prod/templates/nonprodpcmconfigmap.yaml:88:20): communitymanager.nonprod.setupfile.jwt.secretkey is required in values.yaml
INSTALLATION FAILED
To resolve his error, ensure that the jwt.secretkey is set appropriately in the values.yaml file.
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References
Acknowledgement
Change History
07 May 2025: Initial Publication
*The CVSS Environment Score is customer environment specific and will ultimately impact the Overall CVSS Score. Customers can evaluate the impact of this vulnerability in their environments by accessing the links in the Reference section of this Security Bulletin.
Disclaimer
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Document Location
Worldwide
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Document Information
Modified date:
07 May 2025
UID
ibm17232762