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Fencer Intel
medium 5.5

CVE-2015-7550 json

The keyctl_read_key function in security/keys/keyctl.c in the Linux kernel before 4.3.4 does not properly use a semaphore, which allows loc…

published 2016-02-08 10 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2015-7464

cvss
5.5
version 3.0, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.4%
EPSS 0.4% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 35%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

The keyctl_read_key function in security/keys/keyctl.c in the Linux kernel before 4.3.4 does not properly use a semaphore, which allows local users to cause a denial of service (NULL pointer dereference and system crash) or possibly have unspecified other impact via a crafted application that leverages a race condition between keyctl_revoke and keyctl_read calls.

Patch / fix

  • linux Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 4.3.3-3

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2015-7550

  • linux Ubuntu 14.04 LTS 3.13.0-79.123
  • linux-lts-wily Ubuntu 14.04 LTS 4.2.0-27.32~14.04.1
  • linux-lts-vivid Ubuntu 14.04 LTS 3.19.0-51.57~14.04.1
  • linux-lts-utopic Ubuntu 14.04 LTS 3.16.0-60.80~14.04.1

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2015-7550

Ubuntu security data © Canonical Ltd., from https://github.com/canonical/ubuntu-security-notices via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

  • kernel-ec2 SLES 11 SP3-LTSS, OpenStack Cloud 5, Manager Proxy 2.1 +1 more 3.0.101-0.47.79.1
  • kernel-xen SLES 11 SP3-LTSS, OpenStack Cloud 5, Manager Proxy 2.1 +1 more 3.0.101-0.47.79.1
  • kernel-syms SLES 11 SP3-LTSS, OpenStack Cloud 5, Manager Proxy 2.1 +1 more 3.0.101-0.47.79.1
  • kernel-trace SLES 11 SP3-LTSS, OpenStack Cloud 5, Manager Proxy 2.1 +1 more 3.0.101-0.47.79.1
  • kernel-bigsmp SLES 11 SP3-LTSS, OpenStack Cloud 5, Manager Proxy 2.1 +1 more 3.0.101-0.47.79.1
  • kernel-source SLES 11 SP3-LTSS, OpenStack Cloud 5, Manager Proxy 2.1 +1 more 3.0.101-0.47.79.1
  • kernel-default SLES 11 SP3-LTSS, OpenStack Cloud 5, Manager Proxy 2.1 +1 more 3.0.101-0.47.79.1
  • kernel-rt SLE Real Time 11 SP4 3.0.101.rt130-51.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2016:2074-1SUSE-SU-2016:1203-1SUSE-SU-2016:1102-1SUSE-SU-2016:0911-1SUSE-SU-2016:0585-1SUSE-SU-2016:0168-1

  • kernel-source openSUSE Tumbleweed 4.8.13-1.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2024:10128-1

Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2015-7550 updated cvss 4.6

kernel: User triggerable crash from race between key read and rey revoke

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 kernel Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 perf, kernel, python-perf, kernel-kdump, kernel-firmware, kernel-bootwrapper, +1 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, python-perf, kernel-kdump, +8 more Red Hat Enterprise MRG 2 kernel-rt, mrg-rt-release, kernel-rt-trace, kernel-rt-vanilla, kernel-rt-firmware
    affected: no fix planned “Will not fix”

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

Exploit prediction

0.41% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 35% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.0 5.5 CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
NVD 2.0 4.9 AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:C

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-362 Concurrent Execution using Shared Resource with Improper Synchronization
Technology feeds

References

Sources

Fencer Intel keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.