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Description

The Socket Appender in Apache Log4j Core versions 2.0-beta9 through 2.25.2 does not perform TLS hostname verification of the peer certificate, even when the verifyHostName https://logging.apache.org/log4j/2.x/manual/appenders/network.html#SslConfiguration-attr-verifyHostName configuration attribute or the log4j2.sslVerifyHostName https://logging.apache.org/log4j/2.x/manual/systemproperties.html#log4j2.sslVerifyHostName system property is set to true. This issue may allow a man-in-the-middle attacker to intercept or redirect log traffic under the following conditions: * The attacker is able to intercept or redirect network traffic between the client and the log receiver. * The attacker can present a server certificate issued by a certification authority trusted by the Socket Appender’s configured trust store (or by the default Java trust store if no custom trust store is configured). Users are advised to upgrade to Apache Log4j Core version 2.25.3, which addresses this issue. As an alternative mitigation, the Socket Appender may be configured to use a private or restricted trust root to limit the set of trusted certificates.

PUBLISHED Reserved 2025-12-16 | Published 2025-12-18 | Updated 2025-12-19 | Assigner apache




MEDIUM: 6.3CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:H/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:L/VI:N/VA:N/SC:N/SI:L/SA:N

Problem types

CWE-297 Improper Validation of Certificate with Host Mismatch

Product status

Default status
unaffected

2.0-beta9 (maven) before 2.25.3
affected

3.0.0-alpha1 (maven)
affected

Credits

Samuli Leinonen finder

References

www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2025/12/18/1

github.com/apache/logging-log4j2/pull/4002 patch

logging.apache.org/security.html vendor-advisory

logging.apache.org/cyclonedx/vdr.xml vendor-advisory

logging.apache.org/log4j/2.x/manual/systemproperties.html related

logging.apache.org/log4j/2.x/manual/appenders/network.html related

lists.apache.org/thread/xr33kyxq3sl67lwb61ggvm1fzc8k7dvx vendor-advisory

cve.org (CVE-2025-68161)

nvd.nist.gov (CVE-2025-68161)

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