* A buffered audit backend can be used with other audit backends. ([#60076](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/60076), [@crassirostris](https://github.com/crassirostris))

    * [fluentd-gcp addon] Bump prometheus-to-sd to v0.5.0 to pick up security fixes.
    * [metatada-proxy addon] Bump prometheus-to-sd v0.5.0 to pick up security fixes.
* Ensure the backend pools are set correctly for Azure SLB with multiple backend pools (e.g. outbound rules) ([#76691](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/76691), [@feiskyer](https://github.com/feiskyer))

* Ensure the backend pools are set correctly for Azure SLB with multiple backend pools (e.g. outbound rules) ([#76691](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/76691), [@feiskyer](https://github.com/feiskyer))

### Internal Storage Layer
* upgrade to etcd3 prior to upgrading to 1.6 **OR** explicitly specify `--storage-backend=etcd2 --storage-media-type=application/json` when starting the apiserver

### Node Components
* **Kubelet with the Docker-CRI implementation**
  * The Docker-CRI implementation is enabled by default.

## Changelog since v1.23.12

## Changes by Kind

### Bug or Regression

- Azure: Skip "instance not found" error for LB backend address pools ([#111428](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/111428), [@lzhecheng](https://github.com/lzhecheng)) [SIG Cloud Provider]

- Print `<default>` as the value in case kubectl describe ingress shows `default-backend:80` when no default backend is present ([#108506](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/108506), [@jlsong01](https://github.com/jlsong01))

## Changelog since v1.16.13

## Changes by Kind

### Bug or Regression

- Do not add nodes labeled with kubernetes.azure.com/managed=false to backend pool of load balancer. ([#93034](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/93034), [@matthias50](https://github.com/matthias50)) [SIG Cloud Provider]

* fix detach azure disk back off issue which has too big lock in failure retry condition ([#76573](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/76573), [@andyzhangx](https://github.com/andyzhangx))
* Ensure the backend pools are set correctly for Azure SLB with multiple backend pools (e.g. outbound rules) ([#76691](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/76691), [@feiskyer](https://github.com/feiskyer))

# Changelog since v1.17.9

## Changes by Kind

### Bug or Regression

- Do not add nodes labeled with kubernetes.azure.com/managed=false to backend pool of load balancer. ([#93034](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/93034), [@matthias50](https://github.com/matthias50)) [SIG Cloud Provider]

  
  As this code is still very new, it has not been heavily optimized yet;
  while it is expected to _eventually_ have better performance than the
  iptables backend, very little performance testing has been done so far. ([#121046](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/121046), [@danwinship](https://github.com/danwinship))