CVE-2003-0042 Jakarta Tomcat Directory Listing vulnerability

What is CVE-2003-0042?

CVE-2003-0042 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Apache Tomcat, published on 29 Jan 2003. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.

Official description

Jakarta Tomcat before 3.3.1a, when used with JDK 1.3.1 or earlier, allows remote attackers to list directories even with an index.html or other file present, or obtain unprocessed source code for a JSP file, via a URL containing a null character.

Which versions are affected by CVE-2003-0042?

2 open source packages ship an affected version, including org.apache.tomcat:tomcat. It affects 1 product.

Products include Apache Tomcat.

How do I fix CVE-2003-0042?

Upgrade org.apache.tomcat:tomcat to 3.3.1a or later.

Is CVE-2003-0042 being exploited?

It is not confirmed as exploited in the wild, but public exploit code for CVE-2003-0042 exists.

Public exploit code: 1 Exploit-DB entry.

Other vulnerabilities in Apache Tomcat

• CVE-2025-24813 Apache Tomcat Path Equivalence Exploited Critical 10.0
• CVE-2016-8735 Apache Tomcat Remote Code Execution Exploited Critical 9.8
• CVE-2017-12617 Apache Tomcat Remote Code Execution Exploited High 8.1
• CVE-2017-12615 Apache Tomcat on Windows Remote Code Execution Exploited High 8.1
• CVE-2026-34486 Apache Tomcat Missing Encryption of Sensitive Data Exploited High 7.5

All Apache Tomcat vulnerabilities

Sources

• CVE record
• NVD
• OSV
• GitHub advisory
• How this page is made

Also known as GHSA-qfw2-wvrw-mvw4.