Vulnerability Monitor

The vendors, products, and vulnerabilities you care about

CVE-2015-5700

mktexlsr revision 22855 through revision 36625 as packaged in texlive allows local users to write to arbitrary files via a symlink attack.

Security Impact Summary

This vulnerability carries a MEDIUM severity rating with a CVSS v3.1 score of 6.1, requiring local system access to exploit with relatively low complexity without requiring user interaction requiring only low-level privileges . The vulnerability impacts limited data confidentiality, integrity (unauthorized modifications), for affected systems. Impacting 1 product from tug organizations running these solutions should prioritize assessment and patching.

Historical Context

First disclosed in 2017, this vulnerability was reported during a period defined by widespread IoT adoption challenges, mobile security concerns, and the emergence of advanced persistent threat (APT) techniques. Contemporary mitigation strategies focused on secure development practices and third-party component vetting.

Published

2017-08-25T18:29:00.873

Last Modified

2025-04-20T01:37:25.860

Status

Deferred

Source

[email protected]

Severity

CVSSv3.0: 6.1 (MEDIUM)

CVSSv2 Vector

AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:C/A:N

Access Vector: LOCAL
Access Complexity: LOW
Authentication: NONE
Confidentiality Impact: PARTIAL
Integrity Impact: COMPLETE
Availability Impact: NONE

Exploitability Score

3.9

Impact Score

7.8

Weaknesses

Type: Primary
CWE-59

Affected Vendors & Products

Type	Vendor	Product	Version/Range	Vulnerable?
Application	tug	texlive	20100722	Yes
Application	tug	texlive	20110705	Yes
Application	tug	texlive	20120701	Yes
Application	tug	texlive	20130530	Yes
Application	tug	texlive	20140525	Yes

References

http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2015/07/30/6 Mailing List, Third Party Advisory ([email protected])
https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=775139 Issue Tracking, Third Party Advisory ([email protected])
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1181167 Issue Tracking, Patch, Third Party Advisory ([email protected])
https://usn.ubuntu.com/3788-1/ ([email protected])
https://www.tug.org/svn/texlive/trunk/Build/source/texk/kpathsea/mktexlsr?r1=19613&r2=22885 Patch, Vendor Advisory ([email protected])
https://www.tug.org/svn/texlive/trunk/Build/source/texk/kpathsea/mktexlsr?view=log Vendor Advisory ([email protected])
http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2015/07/30/6 Mailing List, Third Party Advisory (af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108)
https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=775139 Issue Tracking, Third Party Advisory (af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108)
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1181167 Issue Tracking, Patch, Third Party Advisory (af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108)
https://usn.ubuntu.com/3788-1/ (af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108)
https://www.tug.org/svn/texlive/trunk/Build/source/texk/kpathsea/mktexlsr?r1=19613&r2=22885 Patch, Vendor Advisory (af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108)
https://www.tug.org/svn/texlive/trunk/Build/source/texk/kpathsea/mktexlsr?view=log Vendor Advisory (af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108)

How SecUtils Interprets This CVE

SecUtils normalizes and enriches National Vulnerability Database (NVD) records by standardizing vendor and product identifiers, aggregating vulnerability metadata from both NVD and MITRE sources, and providing structured context for security teams. For tug's affected products, we extract Common Platform Enumeration (CPE) data, Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE) classifications, CVSS severity metrics, and reference data to enable rapid vulnerability prioritization and asset correlation. This record contains no exploit code, proof-of-concept instructions, or attack methodologies—only defensive intelligence necessary for patch management, risk assessment, and security operations.