CVE-2007-5461 Apache Tomcat Path Traversal Vulnerability

What is CVE-2007-5461?

CVE-2007-5461 is a low-severity path traversal vulnerability in Apache Tomcat, published on 15 Oct 2007. Any signed-in user can exploit it over the network, with no action from the victim.

Official description

Absolute path traversal vulnerability in Apache Tomcat 4.0.0 through 4.0.6, 4.1.0, 5.0.0, 5.5.0 through 5.5.25, and 6.0.0 through 6.0.14, under certain configurations, allows remote authenticated users to read arbitrary files via a WebDAV write request that specifies an entity with a SYSTEM tag.

Weakness: CWE-22

Which versions are affected by CVE-2007-5461?

8 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-2007-5461?

Upgrade to a fixed version.

Upgrade, and resolve every user-supplied path against an allowed base folder before opening it. More about Path traversal.

Is CVE-2007-5461 being exploited?

It is not confirmed as exploited in the wild, but public exploit code for CVE-2007-5461 exists.

Public exploit code: 2 Exploit-DB entries.

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-v5p2-vg3c-pmrr.