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Public proof of concept

CVE-2016-1240

A public proof of concept exists; no exploitation attested.

  • Published2016-10-03
  • WeaknessCWE-20

Am I affected?

With a domain, we read the version its public headers and pages expose. A distribution build can carry the fix under an older number.

Description

The Tomcat init script in the tomcat7 package before 7.0.56-3+deb8u4 and tomcat8 package before 8.0.14-1+deb8u3 on Debian jessie and the tomcat6 and libtomcat6-java packages before 6.0.35-1ubuntu3.8 on Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, the tomcat7 and libtomcat7-java packages before 7.0.52-1ubuntu0.7 on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS, and tomcat8 and libtomcat8-java packages before 8.0.32-1ubuntu1.2 on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS allows local users with access to the tomcat account to gain root privileges via a symlink attack on the Catalina log file, as demonstrated by /var/log/tomcat7/catalina.out.

Timeline

dates in UTC
  1. 2016-10-0315:59CVE publishedNVD
  2. 2026-10-2319:23First public proof of conceptPoC-in-GitHub

Observed activity

isMalicious corpus · updated 2026-10-23 18:48 UTC
Indicators tagged with this CVE, per day0 indicators over 7 days
Block these indicators
  • Firewall list (EDL, text): https://api.ismalicious.com/edl/cve/CVE-2016-1240?format=txt
  • CSV export: https://api.ismalicious.com/edl/cve/CVE-2016-1240?format=csv
  • TAXII collection of exploited CVEs
  • The EDL and CSV take an API key on the Pro plan.

Versions per branch

NVD
Apache Tomcatversion to verify
BranchAffectedFixed in
6.0= 6.0no fix published
7.0= 7.0no fix published
8.0= 8.0no fix published

as publishedRanges as NVD and OSV publish them; a distribution’s build can be fixed under an older number.

Fix

No fix published by the sources we read yet. NVD record

Detection

read 2026-10-23 19:23 UTC
Nuclei template
none so far
ProjectDiscovery
Exploit-DB
no entry
Exploit-DB
Proof-of-concept repositories
2 repositories, unverifiedNaramsim/Offensivemhe18/CVE_Project
PoC-in-GitHub

Sources

  • NVDCVSS 3.07.8read 2026-10-23
  • NVDCVSS 2.07.2read 2026-10-23
  • NVDweakness (CWE)CWE-20read 2026-10-23
  • FIRST EPSSEPSS score9.8 %2026-10-22
  • PoC-in-GitHubproof of concept2read 2026-10-23

Technical details

CVSS v3 Vector
CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Published
2016-10-03
Last Modified
2026-06-17
NVD status
Modified

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2016-1240?

The Tomcat init script in the tomcat7 package before 7.0.56-3+deb8u4 and tomcat8 package before 8.0.14-1+deb8u3 on Debian jessie and the tomcat6 and libtomcat6-java packages before 6.0.35-1ubuntu3.8 on Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, the tomcat7 and libtomcat7-java packages before 7.0.52-1ubuntu0.7 on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS, and tomcat8 and libtomcat8-java packages before 8.0.32-1ubuntu1.2 on Ubuntu 16.04 LTS allows local users with access to the tomcat account to gain root privileges via a symlink attack on the Catalina log file, as demonstrated by /var/log/tomcat7/catalina.out.

Is CVE-2016-1240 actively exploited?

Active exploitation of CVE-2016-1240 has not been confirmed. Its EPSS score was 9.8% on 2026-10-22, the estimated probability of exploitation in the next 30 days.

What is the CVSS score for CVE-2016-1240?

CVE-2016-1240 has a CVSS v3 base score of 7.8 (HIGH severity), with vector string CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H.

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