diff --git a/Lib/tarfile.py b/Lib/tarfile.py
index 6ce5fb1aadc..55bb4e3f156 100644
--- a/Lib/tarfile.py
+++ b/Lib/tarfile.py
@@ -194,7 +194,7 @@ def nti(s):
         try:
             n = int(nts(s, "ascii", "strict") or "0", 8)
         except ValueError:
-            raise HeaderError("invalid header")
+            raise InvalidHeaderError("invalid header")
     else:
         n = 0
         for i in range(len(s) - 1):
@@ -325,8 +325,23 @@ class StreamError(TarError):
     """Exception for unsupported operations on stream-like TarFiles."""
     pass
 class HeaderError(TarError):
+    """Base exception for header errors."""
+    pass
+class EmptyHeaderError(HeaderError):
+    """Exception for empty headers."""
+    pass
+class TruncatedHeaderError(HeaderError):
+    """Exception for truncated headers."""
+    pass
+class EOFHeaderError(HeaderError):
+    """Exception for end of file headers."""
+    pass
+class InvalidHeaderError(HeaderError):
     """Exception for invalid headers."""
     pass
+class SubsequentHeaderError(HeaderError):
+    """Exception for missing and invalid extended headers."""
+    pass
 
 #---------------------------
 # internal stream interface
@@ -1171,14 +1186,16 @@ class TarInfo(object):
     def frombuf(cls, buf, encoding, errors):
         """Construct a TarInfo object from a 512 byte bytes object.
         """
+        if len(buf) == 0:
+            raise EmptyHeaderError("empty header")
         if len(buf) != BLOCKSIZE:
-            raise HeaderError("truncated header")
+            raise TruncatedHeaderError("truncated header")
         if buf.count(NUL) == BLOCKSIZE:
-            raise HeaderError("empty header")
+            raise EOFHeaderError("end of file header")
 
         chksum = nti(buf[148:156])
         if chksum not in calc_chksums(buf):
-            raise HeaderError("bad checksum")
+            raise InvalidHeaderError("bad checksum")
 
         obj = cls()
         obj.name = nts(buf[0:100], encoding, errors)
@@ -1234,8 +1251,6 @@ class TarInfo(object):
            tarfile.
         """
         buf = tarfile.fileobj.read(BLOCKSIZE)
-        if not buf:
-            return
         obj = cls.frombuf(buf, tarfile.encoding, tarfile.errors)
         obj.offset = tarfile.fileobj.tell() - BLOCKSIZE
         return obj._proc_member(tarfile)
@@ -1288,9 +1303,10 @@ class TarInfo(object):
         buf = tarfile.fileobj.read(self._block(self.size))
 
         # Fetch the next header and process it.
-        next = self.fromtarfile(tarfile)
-        if next is None:
-            raise HeaderError("missing subsequent header")
+        try:
+            next = self.fromtarfile(tarfile)
+        except HeaderError:
+            raise SubsequentHeaderError("missing or bad subsequent header")
 
         # Patch the TarInfo object from the next header with
         # the longname information.
@@ -1380,12 +1396,12 @@ class TarInfo(object):
             pos += length
 
         # Fetch the next header.
-        next = self.fromtarfile(tarfile)
+        try:
+            next = self.fromtarfile(tarfile)
+        except HeaderError:
+            raise SubsequentHeaderError("missing or bad subsequent header")
 
         if self.type in (XHDTYPE, SOLARIS_XHDTYPE):
-            if next is None:
-                raise HeaderError("missing subsequent header")
-
             # Patch the TarInfo object with the extended header info.
             next._apply_pax_info(pax_headers, tarfile.encoding, tarfile.errors)
             next.offset = self.offset
@@ -1557,12 +1573,16 @@ class TarFile(object):
             if self.mode == "a":
                 # Move to the end of the archive,
                 # before the first empty block.
-                self.firstmember = None
                 while True:
-                    if self.next() is None:
-                        if self.offset > 0:
-                            self.fileobj.seek(self.fileobj.tell() - BLOCKSIZE)
+                    self.fileobj.seek(self.offset)
+                    try:
+                        tarinfo = self.tarinfo.fromtarfile(self)
+                        self.members.append(tarinfo)
+                    except EOFHeaderError:
+                        self.fileobj.seek(self.offset)
                         break
+                    except HeaderError as e:
+                        raise ReadError(str(e))
 
             if self.mode in "aw":
                 self._loaded = True
@@ -1715,7 +1735,7 @@ class TarFile(object):
 
         try:
             t = cls.taropen(name, mode, fileobj, **kwargs)
-        except IOError:
+        except (IOError, EOFError):
             raise ReadError("not a bzip2 file")
         t._extfileobj = False
         return t
@@ -2287,24 +2307,37 @@ class TarFile(object):
 
         # Read the next block.
         self.fileobj.seek(self.offset)
+        tarinfo = None
         while True:
             try:
                 tarinfo = self.tarinfo.fromtarfile(self)
-                if tarinfo is None:
-                    return
-                self.members.append(tarinfo)
-
-            except HeaderError as e:
+            except EOFHeaderError as e:
                 if self.ignore_zeros:
                     self._dbg(2, "0x%X: %s" % (self.offset, e))
                     self.offset += BLOCKSIZE
                     continue
-                else:
-                    if self.offset == 0:
-                        raise ReadError(str(e))
-                    return None
+            except InvalidHeaderError as e:
+                if self.ignore_zeros:
+                    self._dbg(2, "0x%X: %s" % (self.offset, e))
+                    self.offset += BLOCKSIZE
+                    continue
+                elif self.offset == 0:
+                    raise ReadError(str(e))
+            except EmptyHeaderError:
+                if self.offset == 0:
+                    raise ReadError("empty file")
+            except TruncatedHeaderError as e:
+                if self.offset == 0:
+                    raise ReadError(str(e))
+            except SubsequentHeaderError as e:
+                raise ReadError(str(e))
             break
 
+        if tarinfo is not None:
+            self.members.append(tarinfo)
+        else:
+            self._loaded = True
+
         return tarinfo
 
     #--------------------------------------------------------------------------
diff --git a/Lib/test/test_tarfile.py b/Lib/test/test_tarfile.py
index 551d098ec90..5719f08e34e 100644
--- a/Lib/test/test_tarfile.py
+++ b/Lib/test/test_tarfile.py
@@ -135,7 +135,53 @@ class UstarReadTest(ReadTest):
         fobj.close()
 
 
-class MiscReadTest(ReadTest):
+class CommonReadTest(ReadTest):
+
+    def test_empty_tarfile(self):
+        # Test for issue6123: Allow opening empty archives.
+        # This test checks if tarfile.open() is able to open an empty tar
+        # archive successfully. Note that an empty tar archive is not the
+        # same as an empty file!
+        tarfile.open(tmpname, self.mode.replace("r", "w")).close()
+        try:
+            tar = tarfile.open(tmpname, self.mode)
+            tar.getnames()
+        except tarfile.ReadError:
+            self.fail("tarfile.open() failed on empty archive")
+        self.assertListEqual(tar.getmembers(), [])
+
+    def test_null_tarfile(self):
+        # Test for issue6123: Allow opening empty archives.
+        # This test guarantees that tarfile.open() does not treat an empty
+        # file as an empty tar archive.
+        open(tmpname, "wb").close()
+        self.assertRaises(tarfile.ReadError, tarfile.open, tmpname, self.mode)
+        self.assertRaises(tarfile.ReadError, tarfile.open, tmpname)
+
+    def test_ignore_zeros(self):
+        # Test TarFile's ignore_zeros option.
+        if self.mode.endswith(":gz"):
+            _open = gzip.GzipFile
+        elif self.mode.endswith(":bz2"):
+            _open = bz2.BZ2File
+        else:
+            _open = open
+
+        for char in (b'\0', b'a'):
+            # Test if EOFHeaderError ('\0') and InvalidHeaderError ('a')
+            # are ignored correctly.
+            fobj = _open(tmpname, "wb")
+            fobj.write(char * 1024)
+            fobj.write(tarfile.TarInfo("foo").tobuf())
+            fobj.close()
+
+            tar = tarfile.open(tmpname, mode="r", ignore_zeros=True)
+            self.assertListEqual(tar.getnames(), ["foo"],
+                    "ignore_zeros=True should have skipped the %r-blocks" % char)
+            tar.close()
+
+
+class MiscReadTest(CommonReadTest):
 
     def test_no_name_argument(self):
         fobj = open(self.tarname, "rb")
@@ -264,7 +310,7 @@ class MiscReadTest(ReadTest):
         tar.close()
 
 
-class StreamReadTest(ReadTest):
+class StreamReadTest(CommonReadTest):
 
     mode="r|"
 
@@ -1079,12 +1125,12 @@ class AppendTest(unittest.TestCase):
         self._test()
 
     def test_empty(self):
-        open(self.tarname, "w").close()
+        tarfile.open(self.tarname, "w:").close()
         self._add_testfile()
         self._test()
 
     def test_empty_fileobj(self):
-        fobj = io.BytesIO()
+        fobj = io.BytesIO(b"\0" * 1024)
         self._add_testfile(fobj)
         fobj.seek(0)
         self._test(fileobj=fobj)
@@ -1114,6 +1160,29 @@ class AppendTest(unittest.TestCase):
         self._create_testtar("w:bz2")
         self.assertRaises(tarfile.ReadError, tarfile.open, tmpname, "a")
 
+    # Append mode is supposed to fail if the tarfile to append to
+    # does not end with a zero block.
+    def _test_error(self, data):
+        open(self.tarname, "wb").write(data)
+        self.assertRaises(tarfile.ReadError, self._add_testfile)
+
+    def test_null(self):
+        self._test_error(b"")
+
+    def test_incomplete(self):
+        self._test_error(b"\0" * 13)
+
+    def test_premature_eof(self):
+        data = tarfile.TarInfo("foo").tobuf()
+        self._test_error(data)
+
+    def test_trailing_garbage(self):
+        data = tarfile.TarInfo("foo").tobuf()
+        self._test_error(data + b"\0" * 13)
+
+    def test_invalid(self):
+        self._test_error(b"a" * 512)
+
 
 class LimitsTest(unittest.TestCase):
 
@@ -1228,10 +1297,16 @@ class Bz2PartialReadTest(unittest.TestCase):
                     raise AssertionError("infinite loop detected in tarfile.open()")
                 self.hit_eof = self.tell() == len(self.getvalue())
                 return super(MyBytesIO, self).read(n)
+            def seek(self, *args):
+                self.hit_eof = False
+                return super(MyBytesIO, self).seek(*args)
 
         data = bz2.compress(tarfile.TarInfo("foo").tobuf())
         for x in range(len(data) + 1):
-            tarfile.open(fileobj=MyBytesIO(data[:x]), mode=mode)
+            try:
+                tarfile.open(fileobj=MyBytesIO(data[:x]), mode=mode)
+            except tarfile.ReadError:
+                pass # we have no interest in ReadErrors
 
     def test_partial_input(self):
         self._test_partial_input("r")
diff --git a/Misc/NEWS b/Misc/NEWS
index 8b0446c6cbc..678e0215dfd 100644
--- a/Misc/NEWS
+++ b/Misc/NEWS
@@ -140,6 +140,9 @@ C-API
 Library
 -------
 
+- Issue #6123: tarfile now opens empty archives correctly and consistently
+  raises ReadError on empty files.
+
 - Issue #7354: distutils.tests.test_msvc9compiler - dragfullwindows can 
   be 2.