CVE-2024-52316 is a critical-severity (CVSS 9.8) CWE-391 vulnerability in org.apache.tomcat:tomcat-catalina. A fix is available for org.apache.tomcat:tomcat-catalina — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Apache Tomcat: Authentication bypass when using Jakarta Authentication API
Exploitation Status
No confirmed exploitation observed yet
- CISA assesses this as automatable — exploitation doesn’t require manual, per-target effort, which raises the odds of mass scanning and opportunistic attacks.
- A successful exploit gives an attacker total control of the affected component, not partial access.
- CISA’s own triage has not observed active exploitation or public proof-of-concept code for this CVE as of its last assessment.
Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for CVE-2024-52316.
EPSS Exploitation Probability
EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) is a daily probability model maintained by FIRST.org. It estimates the likelihood a CVE will be exploited in production environments within the next 30 days, derived from real-world threat intelligence signals.
How urgent is this, really
CVE-2024-52316 plotted by exploitation likelihood (EPSS) against impact (CVSS). The shaded corner — EPSS 50%+ and CVSS 7.0+ — is where this CVE doesn't sit, though severity or exploitability alone can still warrant action.
Where this sits among everything scored
Of 378,567 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the < 10% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.
Real-World Exposure
org.apache.tomcat:tomcat-catalina☕org.apache.tomcat:tomcat-catalina☕org.apache.tomcat:tomcat-catalinaReal-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
Unchecked Error Condition vulnerability in Apache Tomcat. If Tomcat is configured to use a custom Jakarta Authentication (formerly JASPIC) ServerAuthContext component which may throw an exception during the authentication process without explicitly setting an HTTP status to indicate failure, the authentication may not fail, allowing the user to bypass the authentication process. There are no known Jakarta Authentication components that behave in this way.
This issue affects Apache Tomcat: from 11.0.0-M1 through 11.0.0-M26, from 10.1.0-M1 through 10.1.30, from 9.0.0-M1 through 9.0.95.
The following versions were EOL at the time the CVE was created but are known to be affected: 8.5.0 though 8.5.100. Other EOL versions may also be affected.
Users are recommended to upgrade to version 11.0.0, 10.1.31 or 9.0.96, which fix the issue.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☕Maven | org.apache.tomcat:tomcat-catalina | all versions | 9.0.96org.apache.tomcat:tomcat-catalina:9.0.96 |
| ☕Maven | org.apache.tomcat:tomcat-catalina | ≥ 10.1.0-M1&&< 10.1.30 | 10.1.30org.apache.tomcat:tomcat-catalina:10.1.30 |
| ☕Maven | org.apache.tomcat:tomcat-catalina | ≥ 11.0.0-M1&&< 11.0.1 | 11.0.1org.apache.tomcat:tomcat-catalina:11.0.1 |
Detection & 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-catalina, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update org.apache.tomcat:tomcat-catalina to 9.0.96 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2024-52316 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.
How O3 protects you
O3 Security's impact-aware SCA analyses which vulnerable code paths your application actually calls, so a match like CVE-2024-52316 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to CVE-2024-52316. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
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.
Red Hat Product Security has assessed this flaw at Attack Complexity as High, and impact metrics Confidentiality and Integrity as High, with a resultant base flaw Security Impact of Important. However, the factors involved in successful exploitation--usage of a custom Jakarta ServerAuthContext component, possible…
| Product | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 | tomcat-1:10.1.36-1.el10_0 | RHSA-2025:7497 |
| Red Hat JBoss Web Server 6.1 on RHEL 8 | jws6-tomcat-0:10.1.36-6.redhat_00007.1.el8jws | RHSA-2025:3608 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2024-52316 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds CVE-2024-52316 across Maven dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.