CVE-2015-8539

high
Published 2016-02-08 · Modified 2026-05-06
CVSS v3
7.8
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
CVSS v2
7.2
VIR risk
7.8

Description

The KEYS subsystem in the Linux kernel before 4.4 allows local users to gain privileges or cause a denial of service (BUG) via crafted keyctl commands that negatively instantiate a key, related to security/keys/encrypted-keys/encrypted.c, security/keys/trusted.c, and security/keys/user_defined.c.

Predictions

Exploit likelihood
75%
Patch ETA

Heuristic predictions, AS-IS, for prioritization only.

Mitigations

vendor Authored 2026-05-27

Vendor advisory: debian — https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2015-8539

vendor Authored 2026-05-27

Vendor advisory: cve@mitre.org — https://github.com/torvalds/linux/commit/096fe9eaea40a17e125569f9e657e34cdb6d73bd

vendor Authored 2026-05-27

Vendor advisory: cve@mitre.org — http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2015/12/09/1

vendor Authored 2026-05-27

Vendor advisory: cve@mitre.org — http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=096fe9eaea40a17e125569f9e657e34cdb6d73bd

vendor Authored 2026-05-27

Vendor advisory: suse — https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2015-8539.html

OS impact

OSVersionStatusFixed in
suse slesaffected
debian debianbookwormfixed0
debian debianbullseyefixed0
debian debianforkyfixed0
debian debiansidfixed0
debian debiantrixiefixed0
ubuntu ubuntu12.04affected
ubuntu ubuntu14.04affected
linux linux-kernelaffected4.4
linux linux-kernel4.4affected

References

CWEs

CWE-269

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