CVE-2012-5885 Improper Access Control in Apache Tomcat

What is CVE-2012-5885?

CVE-2012-5885 is a medium-severity authentication bypass vulnerability in Apache Tomcat, published on 17 Nov 2012. Any signed-in user can exploit it over the network, with no action from the victim.

Official description

The replay-countermeasure functionality in the HTTP Digest Access Authentication implementation in Apache Tomcat 5.5.x before 5.5.36, 6.x before 6.0.36, and 7.x before 7.0.30 tracks cnonce (aka client nonce) values instead of nonce (aka server nonce) and nc (aka nonce-count) values, which makes it easier for remote attackers to bypass intended access restrictions by sniffing the network for valid requests, a different vulnerability than CVE-2011-1184.

Weakness: CWE-264

Which versions are affected by CVE-2012-5885?

6 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-2012-5885?

Upgrade org.apache.tomcat:tomcat to a fixed version for your release line: 5.5.36, 6.0.36 or 7.0.30.

Upgrade, and rotate credentials and sessions that may have been exposed. More about Authentication bypass.

Is CVE-2012-5885 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2012-5885 in the wild and no public exploit code.

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 CVE-2012-3439, GHSA-99rf-92v6-cwx4.