CVE-2022-23181 — tomcat
HIGHCVE-2022-23181 is a high-severity (CVSS 7) CWE-367 vulnerability in org.apache.tomcat:tomcat. A fix is available for org.apache.tomcat:tomcat — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Local privilege escalation with FileStore
EPSS Exploitation Probability
Probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, from FIRST.org EPSS.
How urgent is this, really
CVE-2022-23181 by exploitation likelihood (EPSS) against impact (CVSS). Outside the shaded patch-first corner.
Where this sits among everything scored
Of 385,738 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the < 10% band (highlighted). Counts from FIRST.org, log-scaled.
Real-World Exposure
org.apache.tomcat:tomcat☕org.apache.tomcat:tomcat☕org.apache.tomcat:tomcatReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Maven packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
The fix for bug CVE-2020-9484 introduced a time of check, time of use vulnerability into Apache Tomcat 10.1.0-M1 to 10.1.0-M8, 10.0.0-M5 to 10.0.14, 9.0.35 to 9.0.56 and 8.5.55 to 8.5.73 that allowed a local attacker to perform actions with the privileges of the user that the Tomcat process is using. This issue is only exploitable when Tomcat is configured to persist sessions using the FileStore.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☕Maven | org.apache.tomcat:tomcat | ≥ 10.0.0&&< 10.0.16 | 10.0.16org.apache.tomcat:tomcat:10.0.16 |
| ☕Maven | org.apache.tomcat:tomcat | ≥ 9.0.0&&< 9.0.58 | 9.0.58org.apache.tomcat:tomcat:9.0.58 |
| ☕Maven | org.apache.tomcat:tomcat | all versions | 8.5.75org.apache.tomcat:tomcat:8.5.75 |
Affected Products
tomcatapachedebian linuxdebianagile engineering data managementoraclecommunications cloud native core policyoraclefinancial services crime and compliance management studiooraclemanaged file transferoracleDetection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for org.apache.tomcat:tomcat, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update org.apache.tomcat:tomcat to 10.0.16 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2022-23181 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
If you can't upgrade right away: gate or disable the affected feature, validate untrusted input at the boundary, and avoid passing attacker-controlled data into the vulnerable path. O3's runtime protection blocks exploitation in production as an interim safeguard until the upgrade lands.
Fixing This On Your OS
If you run this on a Linux distribution, patch through your package manager against the distro's own security advisory below — it tracks the exact backported fix for your release, which can ship on a different timeline (and sometimes a different severity) than the upstream project.
In Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8, Red Hat Certificate System 10 and Identity Management are using the `pki-servlet-engine` component. This component embeds a version of Tomcat which is not affected by this flaw, as it does not include the fix for CVE-2020-9484. Additionally, in these specific contexts, the prerequisites…
| Product | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|
| JWS 5.7.0 | tomcat | RHSA-2022:7273 |
| Red Hat Fuse 7.11 | tomcat | RHSA-2022:5532 |
| Red Hat JBoss Web Server 5.7 on RHEL 7 | jws5-tomcat-0:9.0.62-9.redhat_00005.1.el7jws | RHSA-2022:7272 |
| Spring Boot 2.7.2.SP1 | tomcat | RHSA-2023:0272 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2022-23181 in your dependencies?
Find it across Maven, including transitive dependencies.