CVE-2015-1336

Description

The daily mandb cleanup job in Man-db before 2.7.6.1-1 as packaged in Ubuntu and Debian allows local users with access to the man account to gain privileges via vectors involving insecure chown use.

Fixed in Linux distributions

Distributions backport fixes, so the version that fixes this vulnerability differs per release — upgrade to at least the version shown. From the distributions' security trackers and advisories.

Debian

Security tracker ↗

Release	Package	Fixed in	Advisory
Debian 14	man-db	2.7.6-1	—
Debian 13	man-db	2.7.6-1	—
Debian 12	man-db	2.7.6-1	—

Ubuntu

Security tracker ↗

Release	Package	Fixed in	Advisory
Ubuntu 14.04 LTS	man-db	No fix yet	—

Show 1 more (older releases, extended support, other products)

Release	Package	Fixed in	Advisory
Ubuntu Pro 16.04 LTS	man-db	2.7.5-1ubuntu0.1~esm1	USN-5334-1

Public exploits

Exploit or proof-of-concept code for this vulnerability is publicly available, which lowers the bar for attackers. Treat it as a reason to patch sooner.

Third-party code, not reviewed by us. Public PoCs are sometimes fake or contain malware. Read the code first and run it only in an isolated lab, against systems you are authorised to test.

Exploit-DB 1

Man-db 2.6.7.1 - Local Privilege Escalation EDB-41158 · local · Dec 2, 2015 · verified

Sources: PoC-in-GitHub, Metasploit Framework, Exploit-DB — updated daily. Only links are listed; no exploit code is hosted here.

Advisories 1

USN-5334-1 man-db vulnerability Ubuntu Security Notices (USN) · Jun 25, 2026

The daily mandb cleanup job in Man-db before 2.7.6.1-1 as packaged in Ubuntu and Debian allows local users with access to the man account t…