CVE-2025-2652: Employee Gate Pass System Info Disclosure

CVE-2025-2652 Overview

A directory listing information disclosure vulnerability has been identified in SourceCodester Employee and Visitor Gate Pass Logging System version 1.0. This vulnerability allows remote attackers to enumerate directory contents on the affected web server due to improper web server configuration. The exposure of directory listings can reveal sensitive file structures, configuration files, backup files, and other resources that should not be publicly accessible.

Critical Impact

Remote attackers can browse server directory contents without authentication, potentially exposing sensitive application files, database backups, configuration data, and internal system information across multiple sub-directories.

Affected Products

• SourceCodester Employee and Visitor Gate Pass Logging System 1.0
• Oretnom23 Employee And Visitor Gate Pass Logging System

Discovery Timeline

• 2025-03-23 - CVE-2025-2652 published to NVD
• 2025-03-26 - Last updated in NVD database

Technical Details for CVE-2025-2652

Vulnerability Analysis

This vulnerability falls under CWE-548 (Exposure of Information Through Directory Listing), a common web server misconfiguration issue. When directory listing is enabled on a web server without proper access controls, any user who navigates to a directory URL that lacks an index file will be presented with a complete listing of all files and subdirectories within that path.

In the context of the Employee and Visitor Gate Pass Logging System, this misconfiguration affects multiple sub-directories within the application. The vulnerability requires no authentication and can be exploited remotely over the network with minimal complexity. While the direct impact is limited to information disclosure without affecting system integrity or availability, the exposed information could facilitate further attacks against the application.

Root Cause

The root cause of this vulnerability is improper web server configuration that fails to disable directory listing functionality. By default, many web servers (Apache, Nginx, IIS) may have directory indexing enabled, which automatically generates an HTML page listing directory contents when no default index file (such as index.php, index.html) exists in a directory. The application developers failed to include proper server configuration directives to disable this behavior across all application directories.

Attack Vector

The attack can be launched remotely over the network without requiring any user interaction or prior authentication. An attacker simply needs to:

1. Identify accessible directories within the web application
2. Navigate to directory URLs that lack index files
3. Browse the automatically generated directory listings
4. Download or access exposed files containing potentially sensitive information

This reconnaissance technique can reveal application structure, backup files, configuration files, upload directories, and other sensitive resources that may assist in developing more sophisticated attacks against the system.

Detection Methods for CVE-2025-2652

Indicators of Compromise

• Unusual HTTP requests targeting directory paths without filenames (e.g., /uploads/, /backup/, /config/)
• Web server access logs showing sequential requests to multiple directory paths from the same IP address
• HTTP responses containing HTML with directory listing characteristics (parent directory links, file icons, modification timestamps)

Detection Strategies

• Monitor web server access logs for requests ending with trailing slashes that return HTTP 200 responses with large content sizes
• Implement web application firewall (WAF) rules to detect and alert on directory traversal patterns
• Conduct regular security scans using tools that identify directory listing exposures

Monitoring Recommendations

• Enable detailed logging on the web server to capture all directory access attempts
• Set up alerts for bulk file download patterns that may indicate directory enumeration
• Review server configuration periodically to ensure directory listing remains disabled

How to Mitigate CVE-2025-2652

Immediate Actions Required

• Disable directory listing in the web server configuration immediately
• Review all exposed directories and identify any sensitive files that may have been compromised
• Implement proper access controls on all application directories
• Add index files to all directories to prevent listing even if configuration changes are reverted

Patch Information

The recommended remediation is to change the web server configuration settings to disable directory listing. For additional technical details and vulnerability information, refer to the VulDB entry #300667 and the GitHub CVE documentation.

Workarounds

• Disable directory listing in your web server configuration
• Add blank index.html or index.php files to all directories as a temporary measure
• Use .htaccess files (Apache) to deny directory browsing on a per-directory basis
• Implement network-level access controls to restrict access to sensitive directories

# Apache - Disable directory listing globally in httpd.conf
Options -Indexes

# Apache - Disable via .htaccess file in application root
# Create or edit .htaccess file with:
Options -Indexes

# Nginx - Disable directory listing in server block
autoindex off;

# IIS - Disable directory browsing via web.config
# Set directoryBrowse enabled="false" in system.webServer section