CVE-2015-3246

high

Published 2015-08-11 · Modified 2026-05-06

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CVSS v3

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CVSS v4 NEW

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not yet in upstream

VIR risk

8.2

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.

Predictions

Exploit likelihood

20%

Patch ETA

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Heuristic predictions, AS-IS, for prioritization only.

Mitigations

No mitigations published for this CVE yet.

The vendor-content worker queues fetches as references arrive (check back in a few minutes). Or — if you've already worked around this in production — publish your fix to the community-verified tier.

✚ Propose a mitigation on Community → Mitigations published via the community go through AI scoring + 2 human reviewers + 7-day silent objection window before landing here with source_tier=community-verified.

Exploits

Public proof-of-concept code below. AS-IS, for defenders and authorised testing only.

Metasploit modules

exploit_linux/local/libuser_roothelper_priv_esc rank 500

Libuser roothelper Privilege Escalation

Source code queued for fetch — refresh in a moment.

OS impact

OS	Version	Status	Fixed in
debian	bookworm	fixed	`1:0.62~dfsg-0.1`
debian	bullseye	fixed	`1:0.62~dfsg-0.1`
debian	forky	fixed	`1:0.62~dfsg-0.1`
debian	sid	fixed	`1:0.62~dfsg-0.1`
debian	trixie	fixed	`1:0.62~dfsg-0.1`

Application impact

Vendor	Product	Versions
redhat	libuser	`{"endIncluding":"0.56.13-5"}`
redhat	libuser	`0.60-1`
redhat	libuser	`0.60-2`
redhat	libuser	`0.60-3`
redhat	libuser	`0.60-4`
redhat	libuser	`0.60-5`
redhat	libuser	`0.60-6`

References

CWEs

CWE-264

Community-verified mitigations for this CVE will appear above when contributors publish them.

Verify integrity in audit chain (admin only). AS-IS.