Information
The server.number attribute represents the specific version of Tomcat that is executing. This value is presented to Tomcat clients when connect.
Advertising a valid server version may provide attackers with information useful for locating vulnerabilities that affect the server platform. Altering the server version string may increase the complexity for attackers to determine which vulnerabilities affect the server platform.
NOTE: Nessus has provided the target output to assist in reviewing the benchmark to ensure target compliance.
Solution
Perform the following to alter the server version string that gets displayed when clients connect to the server.
- Extract the ServerInfo.properties file from the catalina.jar file: $ cd $CATALINA_HOME/lib$ jar xf catalina.jar org/apache/catalina/util/ServerInfo.properties
- Navigate to the util directory that was created $ cd org/apache/Catalina/util
- Open ServerInfo.properties in an editor
- Update the server.number attribute server.number=<someversion>
- Update the catalina.jar with the modified ServerInfo.properties file. $ jar uf catalina.jar org/apache/catalina/util/ServerInfo.properties