CVE-2016-1240

· N/AModified

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CVSS v3.1

N/A

EPSS

9.78%

Published

Oct 3, 2016

Modified

May 6, 2026

Public PoC / Exploit (2)

All weaponized →

TrickestTrickest PoC index Exploit-DBApache Tomcat 8/7/6 (Debian-Based Distros) - Local Privilege Escalation

Links to public security research (Exploit-DB, Nuclei, Trickest, GitHub) for defensive use only.

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.

Weaknesses (CWE)

CWE-20

Affected Products (9)

apache · tomcatvulnerable

canonical · ubuntu_linux

apache · tomcatvulnerable

debian · debian_linux

References (20)

http://legalhackers.com/advisories/Tomcat-DebPkgs-Root-Privilege-Escalation-Exploit-CVE-2016-1240.html

http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/170857/Apache-Tomcat-On-Ubuntu-Log-Init-Privilege-Escalation.html

http://rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2017-0457.html

http://www.debian.org/security/2016/dsa-3669