Directory traversal vulnerability in Elasticsearch before 1.6.1 allows remote attackers to read arbitrary files via unspecified vectors related to snapshot API calls.
CVE-2015-5531
MEDIUMCVSS v2 · 5.05.0WeaponizedEG-KEV Tier 2: WeaponizedEG-KEV is EchelonGraph's own tiering of exploitation signals from CISA KEV, CISA's SSVC data (Vulnrichment), ransomware data, public exploit-code references and EPSS.Tier 2 is not evidence of exploitation. It means a Metasploit module exists, or Exploit-DB marks a public exploit verified, or CISA's SSVC data says "public PoC" and EPSS is 50% or more. EchelonGraph does not test whether exploit code works.Signals for this CVE: a Metasploit module, EPSS in the top 5%, EPSS 50% or more, other public exploit code (a GitHub or vendor proof of concept, or an Exploit-DB entry not marked verified).First public exploit code on record: 2015-10-02 (Exploit-DB EDB-38383)EchelonGraph confidence 70%: a heuristic from the tier and the number of signals, not a measured probability.
EchelonGraph scoreLOW confidence
“—” beside the score: it is equal to NVD's CVSS v2 base score.
This CVE was only ever scored under CVSS v2.0. NVD CVSS v2.0 base 5.0 — NVD rates that MEDIUM (NVD's v2 bands: LOW 0.0–3.9 / MEDIUM 4.0–6.9 / HIGH 7.0–10.0; no CRITICAL band). Vector AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:N/A:N. CVSS v2 is an older, coarser metric than v3.1/v4.0 (no Scope, no User Interaction, no Attack Requirements), so it is not directly comparable to a v3 or v4 score. NVD has never re-scored this record under v3. EPSS predicts 95% exploitation probability in the next 30 days; it does not lift the v2 base. EPSS sets EG Risk's exploitation input. Confidence: LOW.
Triggered by: NVD CVSS v2.0 (legacy fallback)
Sources: NVD CVSS v2.0
5.0EG
EchelonGraph verdictPlan a fixRemediate within your standard update timelines at low or medium mission impact and sooner than that at high (the SSVC decision on this page).
- High exploitation likelihood — EPSS 95%
- Public exploit code is available (Metasploit, other public proof-of-concept code)
CISA-KEV: Not listedEPSS PROB: 95%CVSS v2: 5.0Exploit: Metasploit · other public PoCExposed services: Not assessed
A fix is available — apply it.
- CVSS v2.0 (legacy)
- 5.0MEDIUMNVD never assigned a CVSS v3 rating to this CVE
- EG Score
- 5.0MEDIUMlow confidence
- EG Risk
- 60EG Risk 60/100
EG Risk is EchelonGraph's 0–100 priority score: it fuses intrinsic severity with real-world exploitation and automatability so you can rank equal-severity CVEs and fix the most dangerous first. Higher = act sooner. Distinct from the 0–10 EG Score (severity).
How it’s computed (value × EchelonGraph’s weight)Severity50% × 45%The EG Score, 5.0 of 10.Exploitation95% × 40%FIRST EPSS: the 30-day exploitation probability when EchelonGraph scored this CVE.Automatability0% × 15%CISA's BOD 26-04 default: no one has published Automatable for this CVE, and CISA treats it as “no” for a CVE not in KEV.SSVC (CISA's decision table, applied by EchelonGraph): Track at low, Track* at medium and Attend at high mission impact.Exploitation public PoC (exploit code on record) · Automatable no (CISA's BOD 26-04 default) · Technical impact total (CISA's BOD 26-04 default). EchelonGraph holds no SSVC assessment of this CVE from CISA: none of these inputs is from Vulnrichment. EchelonGraph applied CISA's decision table to them; CISA publishes SSVC inputs and the table, not a decision for each CVE.Action: A fix is available. Apply it within your standard update timelines at low or medium mission impact and sooner than that at high. - EPSS PROB
- 95%
- EPSS %ILE
- 99th
- KEV
- Not listed
SSVC (CISA's decision table, applied by EchelonGraph)Track at low, Track* at medium and Attend at high mission impact.
A fix is available. Apply it within your standard update timelines at low or medium mission impact and sooner than that at high.
Exploitation public PoC (exploit code on record) · Automatable no (CISA's BOD 26-04 default) · Technical impact total (CISA's BOD 26-04 default). EchelonGraph holds no SSVC assessment of this CVE from CISA: none of these inputs is from Vulnrichment. EchelonGraph applied CISA's decision table to them; CISA publishes SSVC inputs and the table, not a decision for each CVE. Mission impact is CISA's Mission & Well-being decision point, and only you can judge it. CISA's table makes it high when Mission Prevalence is Essential — the vulnerable component "directly provides capabilities that constitute at least one MEF for at least one entity" (MEF: mission essential function) — or when Public Well-Being Impact is Irreversible: "multiple fatalities are likely", the cyber-physical system "is likely lost or destroyed", "extreme or serious externalities" are imposed on other parties, or social systems such as elections or the financial grid "are destabilized and potentially collapse". CISA's decision table
BOD 26-04 (CISA's remediation timeline, Table 1)14 days if the affected system is publicly exposed; Fix on system upgrade if it is not.
In CISA KEV no (CISA's KEV catalog) · Automatable no (CISA's BOD 26-04 default) · Technical impact total (CISA's BOD 26-04 default). Where an input reads “CISA's BOD 26-04 default”, no one has published it for this CVE, and CISA's implementation guidance says: “If “Automatable” and “Technical Impact” information items about a CVE ID are not available and the CVE ID is not in the KEV Catalog, CISA will treat its values as “no” and “total,” respectively, until CISA or a third party provides metadata about the CVE ID. CISA will always provide the Vulnrichment data for a CVE ID listed in the KEV Catalog.” Whether your system is publicly exposed is yours to answer. BOD 26-04 binds US Federal Civilian Executive Branch agencies; for anyone else it is CISA's published timeline, a reference rather than an obligation. The directive · how EchelonGraph applies it
Published
August 17, 2015
Last Modified
May 6, 2026
References (7)
- MITRE · CVE Programhttp://packetstormsecurity.com/files/132721/Elasticsearch-Directory-Traversal.html
- MITRE · CVE Programhttp://packetstormsecurity.com/files/133797/ElasticSearch-Path-Traversal-Arbitrary-File-Download.html
- MITRE · CVE Programhttp://packetstormsecurity.com/files/133964/ElasticSearch-Snapshot-API-Directory-Traversal.html
- MITRE · CVE Programhttp://www.securityfocus.com/archive/1/536017/100/0/threaded (archived copy: the site no longer serves it)
- MITRE · CVE Programhttp://www.securityfocus.com/bid/75935 (archived copy: the site no longer serves it)
- MITRE · CVE Programhttps://www.elastic.co/community/security/Vendor Advisory
- MITRE · CVE Programhttps://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/38383/
Affected Packages
(1 across 1 ecosystem)
Maven(1)
| Package | Vulnerable range | Fix by version range | Dependents |
|---|---|---|---|
| org.elasticsearch:elasticsearch | 0.10.0 ... 1.6.0 (122 versions) |
| — |
Data Freshness Timeline
(refreshed 3× in last 7d / 4× in last 30d)
Each row is a time one of our pipelines fetched, updated or re-scored this CVE. For example, "NVD update" means NVD published or revised its analysis for this CVE; "MITRE cvelistV5" means we ingested or refreshed it from the CNA feed. An arrow marks a change the record states ("CVSS v3 → 9.1"); EPSS and GHSA rows show the values recorded at that time, not what changed (EPSS values are rounded; hover one for the exact figures). Most recent first.
A repeat, a row identical to one the same pipeline wrote less than 10 seconds earlier, is not a separate refresh and is not counted. 12 repeat rows among the latest 55 are merged into the row they repeat.
- 2026-10-12 16:27 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 95% · 99th percentile
- 2026-10-12 01:14 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-10-08 16:35 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 95% · 99th percentile
- 2026-09-30 09:05 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-09-10 09:26 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 95% · 99th percentile
- 2026-09-06 13:42 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 95% · 99th percentile
- 2026-08-27 14:20 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 95% · 99th percentile
- 2026-08-16 02:09 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 95% · 99th percentile
- 2026-08-11 13:36 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-08-08 16:32 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-08-05 19:12 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-07-30 01:26 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-07-26 13:54 UTCEG score recomputeAssessed again: 5.0 MEDIUM
- 2026-07-24 14:13 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-07-23 01:18 UTCEG score recompute▼ 9.00
- 2026-07-23 00:20 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-22 21:59 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-22 14:04 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-07-15 16:54 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-07-09 19:05 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-07-06 16:24 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-07-06 02:20 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-07-01 15:02 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-06-30 23:19 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-06-28 14:04 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
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- 2026-06-23 21:30 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-06-16 17:50 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-06-15 17:45 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-06-12 23:09 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-06-11 13:57 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-06-10 13:18 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-06-06 13:45 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-06-05 22:44 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-06-05 06:08 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-06-04 13:10 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-06-02 20:10 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-05-31 22:28 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-05-29 13:41 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-05-28 13:42 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-05-23 00:03 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-05-22 21:15 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-05-21 22:40 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
- 2026-05-18 21:30 UTCEPSS rescoreEPSS 92% · 99th percentile
Publicly available exploits
(4 references)Public exploit code is referenced for this CVE (1 Metasploit module, 1 Exploit-DB entry, 1 GitHub PoC), as is 1 Nuclei detection template. A detection template checks whether a system is affected; it is not necessarily exploit code. Defenders should treat patch urgency accordingly.
- Metasploitauxiliary/scanner/http/elasticsearch_traversal✓ verifiedPublished Oct 16, 2015
ElasticSearch Snapshot API Directory Traversal
Open source ↗ - Open source ↗GitHub PoCMoCh3n/CVE-2015-5531-POCPublished Sep 21, 2022
- Nucleihttp/cves/2015/CVE-2015-5531.yamlPublished Jan 5, 2022
ElasticSearch <1.6.1 - Local File Inclusion
Open source ↗ - Exploit-DBEDB-38383Published Oct 2, 2015
ElasticSearch 1.6.0 - Arbitrary File Download
Open source ↗
Related CVEs(same product)
Same product
10 shownMaven:org.elasticsearch:elasticsearch
Frequently asked(4)
What is CVE-2015-5531?
CVE-2015-5531 is a medium-severity vulnerability; its CVE record was published on August 17, 2015. Directory traversal vulnerability in Elasticsearch before 1.6.1 allows remote attackers to read arbitrary files via unspecified vectors related to snapshot API calls.
When was CVE-2015-5531 made public?
CVE-2015-5531 was made public on July 16, 2015: that is the date its CVE record's CNA, MITRE Corporation, gives for when the vulnerability was made public. The CVE record itself was published on August 17, 2015. EchelonGraph's copy of the record carries a last-modified date of May 6, 2026; the record at its source may have been updated since.
Is CVE-2015-5531 actively exploited?
CVE-2015-5531 is not currently on CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog. EchelonGraph's EG-KEV model places it in Tier 2 (Weaponized), which is not evidence of exploitation: a Metasploit module exists for it. EchelonGraph does not test whether exploit code works. FIRST EPSS estimates a 95% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days (99th percentile of EPSS-scored CVEs).
How do I remediate CVE-2015-5531?
A fix for CVE-2015-5531 is available: update to the fixed version the vendor names in its advisory.
Dependency Blast Radius
See which npm, PyPI, Go, and Maven packages are affected by CVE-2015-5531
Is Your Infrastructure Affected by CVE-2015-5531?
EchelonGraph automatically scans your cloud infrastructure and maps CVE exposure using blast radius analysis.