CVEvulnerability

CVE-2015-3246

7.4 HIGH Known exploited Published 2015-08-11 Modified 2026-10-02 Official page ↗

CISA Known Exploited Vulnerability

Red Hat Libuser Race Condition Vulnerability — Red Hat Libuser

Red Hat libuser contains a race condition vulnerability that allows authenticated local users to corrupt the /etc/passwd file to cause a denial of service or privilege escalation.

Added to KEV
2026-08-26
Remediation due
2026-09-09
Ransomware use
Unknown
Required action
Apply mitigations in accordance with vendor instructions, ensuring compliance with CISA’s BOD 26-04 Prioritizing Security Updates Based on Risk (see URL in Notes) guidance and CISA’s “Forensics Triage Requirements” (see URL in Notes). Follow applicable BOD 26-04 guidance for cloud services or discontinue use of the product if mitigations are unavailable. Stakeholders are responsible for evaluating each asset's internet exposure and ensuring adherence to BOD 26-04 patching guidelines.
Notes
This vulnerability affects an open-source component, third-party library, protocol, or proprietary implementation that could be used by different products. For more information, please see: https://access.redhat.com/articles/1537873 ; BOD 26-04: https://www.cisa.gov/news-events/directives/bod-26-04-prioritizing-security-updates-based-risk ; Forensics Triage Requirements: https://www.cisa.gov/news-events/directives/bod-26-04-implementation-guidance-prioritizing-security-updates-based-risk ; https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2015-3246
Status
Analyzed
Published
2015-08-11
Last modified
2026-10-02
Assigner
[email protected]
CVSS 3.1 (134c704f-9b21-4f2e-91b3-4a467353bcc0)
7.4 HIGH — CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
CVSS 2.0 ([email protected])
7.2 HIGH — AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:C/I:C/A:C
Weaknesses
CWE-264, CWE-367

Description

libuser before 0.56.13-8 and 0.60 before 0.60-7, as used in the userhelper program in the usermode package, directly modifies /etc/passwd, which allows local users to cause a denial of service (inconsistent file state) by causing an error during the modification. NOTE: this issue can be combined with CVE-2015-3245 to gain privileges.

Affected configurations

• redhat enterprise linux 5.0 • redhat enterprise linux 6.0 • redhat enterprise linux 7.0 • opensuse opensuse 13.2 • libuser project libuser (< 0.56.13-8) • libuser project libuser (>= 0.60 < 0.60-7)

Related

Weakness · not in database (1)

Weakness · CWE (1)

  • CWE-367 Time-of-check Time-of-use (TOCTOU) Race Condition weakness

References