{"id":25959,"date":"2025-04-17T22:03:28","date_gmt":"2025-04-17T22:03:28","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2025-07-07T05:19:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-07T11:19:09","slug":"cve-2025-3417-unauthorized-data-modification-and-privilege-escalation-in-wordpress-embedder-plugin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/cve-2025-3417-unauthorized-data-modification-and-privilege-escalation-in-wordpress-embedder-plugin\/","title":{"rendered":"<strong>CVE-2025-3417: Unauthorized Data Modification and Privilege Escalation in WordPress Embedder Plugin<\/strong>"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Overview<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In the digital world, vulnerabilities in software are a common occurrence, capable of putting vast amounts of data at risk. The CVE-2025-3417 is a critical security vulnerability that affects the Embedder plugin for WordPress, a widely-used platform for creating websites. This vulnerability allows an attacker with only Subscriber-level access or above to modify arbitrary options on the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/cve-2025-2891-arbitrary-file-upload-vulnerability-in-real-estate-7-wordpress-theme\/\"  data-wpil-monitor-id=\"29904\">WordPress<\/a> site, potentially granting themselves administrative user access. Due to the prevalence of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/cve-2023-4536-critical-vulnerability-in-my-account-page-editor-wordpress-plugin\/\"  data-wpil-monitor-id=\"29964\">WordPress and the severity of this vulnerability<\/a>, it&#8217;s crucial for businesses and individuals using the affected plugin to understand the risks and apply the necessary patch.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Vulnerability Summary<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>CVE ID: CVE-2025-3417<br \/>\nSeverity: High (8.8 CVSS score)<br \/>\nAttack Vector: Network<br \/>\nPrivileges Required: Low (Subscriber-level access)<br \/>\nUser Interaction: Required<br \/>\nImpact: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/cve-2023-6600-unauthorized-data-modification-and-stored-cross-site-scripting-in-omgf-gdpr-dsgvo-compliant-faster-google-fonts-easy-wordpress-plugin\/\"  data-wpil-monitor-id=\"30340\">Unauthorized modification of data<\/a>, potential system compromise and data leakage<\/p>\n<p><strong>Affected Products<\/strong><\/p><div id=\"ameeb-350616243\" class=\"ameeb-content-2 ameeb-entity-placement\"><div style=\"border-left: 4px solid #555; padding-left: 20px; margin: 48px 0; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; color: #ffffff; line-height: 1.6; max-width: 720px;\">\r\n  <h2 style=\"margin-top: 0; font-size: 22px; font-weight: 600; display: flex; align-items: center; letter-spacing: -0.02em;\">\r\n    <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/chat\" style=\"display: inline-flex; align-items: center; margin-right: 10px;\">\r\n      <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Best-App-icon-Ameeba.png\" alt=\"Ameeba Chat Icon\" style=\"width: 42px; height: 42px;\" \/>\r\n    <\/a>\r\n    Share secrets securely\r\n  <\/h2>\r\n\r\n  <p style=\"margin-bottom: 14px; color: #d1d5db;\">\r\n    Ameeba is private infrastructure for communication and sensitive work built on encrypted identity instead of exposed corporate identity systems.\r\n  <\/p>\r\n\r\n  <p style=\"margin-bottom: 18px; color: #a1a1aa;\">\r\n    Passwords, credentials, confidential files, screenshots, internal discussions, sensitive AI context, and private coordination should not become exposed across ordinary communication platforms.\r\n  <\/p>\r\n\r\n  <ul style=\"list-style: none; padding-left: 0; margin-bottom: 24px; color: #e4e4e7;\">\r\n    <li style=\"margin-bottom: 8px;\">\u2022 Encrypted identity<\/li>\r\n    <li style=\"margin-bottom: 8px;\">\u2022 Private Spaces for organizations and teams<\/li>\r\n    <li style=\"margin-bottom: 8px;\">\u2022 End-to-end encrypted chat, calls, files, and notes<\/li>\r\n    <li style=\"margin-bottom: 8px;\">\u2022 Sensitive AI work and protected collaboration<\/li>\r\n    <li>\u2022 Built for information that cannot leak<\/li>\r\n  <\/ul>\r\n\r\n  <p style=\"font-style: italic; font-weight: 600; margin-bottom: 24px; color: #ffffff;\">\r\n    Our mission is to secure human work alongside AI.\r\n  <\/p>\r\n\r\n  <div style=\"display: flex; flex-wrap: wrap; gap: 12px;\">\r\n    <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/chat\/download\" style=\"background-color: #ffffff; color: #000000; padding: 10px 20px; text-decoration: none; border-radius: 8px; font-weight: 500;\">\r\n      Download Ameeba\r\n    <\/a>\r\n\r\n    <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/chat\" style=\"border: 1px solid #ffffff; color: #ffffff; padding: 10px 20px; text-decoration: none; border-radius: 8px; font-weight: 500;\">\r\n      Learn More\r\n    <\/a>\r\n  <\/div>\r\n<\/div><\/div>\n<p>Product | Affected Versions<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/cve-2023-3211-unauthenticated-sql-injection-vulnerability-in-wordpress-database-administrator-plugin\/\"  data-wpil-monitor-id=\"29982\">WordPress Embedder Plugin<\/a> | 1.3 to 1.3.5<\/p>\n<p><strong>How the Exploit Works<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The exploit relies on the ajax_set_global_option() function in the Embedder plugin, which lacks a proper capability check. This oversight allows authenticated attackers with Subscriber-level access to update <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/cve-2025-2006-arbitrary-file-upload-vulnerability-in-inline-image-upload-for-bbpress-wordpress-plugin\/\"  data-wpil-monitor-id=\"30202\">arbitrary options on the WordPress<\/a> site. By <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/fortinet-s-fortigate-vulnerability-ssl-vpn-symlink-exploit-puts-user-access-at-risk-post-patching\/\"  data-wpil-monitor-id=\"30203\">exploiting this vulnerability<\/a>, an attacker could change the default role for new registrations to &#8220;administrator,&#8221; then create a new account. This newly created account would have full administrative access to the WordPress site, permitting the attacker to modify content, change site settings, or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/cve-2024-56406-buffer-overflow-vulnerability-in-perl-leading-to-potential-denial-of-service-and-code-execution\/\"  data-wpil-monitor-id=\"33164\">potentially install malicious code<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Conceptual Example Code<\/strong><\/p><div id=\"ameeb-4089440252\" class=\"ameeb-content ameeb-entity-placement\"><div class=\"poptin-embedded\" data-id=\"f6b387694f681\"><\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<\/div>\n<p>Below is a simplified, conceptual example of how an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/cve-2021-27289-replay-attack-vulnerability-uncovered-in-zigbee-smart-home-kit\/\"  data-wpil-monitor-id=\"35566\">attacker might exploit this vulnerability<\/a>. This is a mock AJAX request that modifies the site&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/cve-2024-51978-unauthenticated-default-administrator-password-generation\/\"  data-wpil-monitor-id=\"64458\">default role for new users to &#8220;administrator&#8221;<\/a>:<\/p>\n<pre><code class=\"\" data-line=\"\">POST \/wp-admin\/admin-ajax.php HTTP\/1.1\nHost: target.example.com\nContent-Type: application\/x-www-form-urlencoded\naction=embedder_set_global_option&amp;option=default_role&amp;value=administrator<\/code><\/pre>\n<p>In this example, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/cve-2025-46342-kyverno-policy-engine-vulnerability-enables-unauthorized-actions-in-kubernetes\/\"  data-wpil-monitor-id=\"42714\">&#8220;action&#8221; parameter is set to the vulnerable<\/a> function, &#8220;embedder_set_global_option. The &#8220;option&#8221; parameter is set to &#8220;default_role&#8221;, and the &#8220;value&#8221; parameter is set to &#8220;administrator&#8221;. This request would set the default role for new users to &#8220;administrator&#8221;, allowing the attacker to create a new account with full <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/cve-2025-26959-privilege-escalation-vulnerability-in-quy-le-91-administrator-z\/\"  data-wpil-monitor-id=\"34986\">administrative privileges<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Overview In the digital world, vulnerabilities in software are a common occurrence, capable of putting vast amounts of data at risk. The CVE-2025-3417 is a critical security vulnerability that affects the Embedder plugin for WordPress, a widely-used platform for creating websites. This vulnerability allows an attacker with only Subscriber-level access or above to modify arbitrary [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"vendor":[],"product":[],"attack_vector":[76],"asset_type":[],"severity":[],"exploit_status":[],"class_list":["post-25959","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","attack_vector-privilege-escalation"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25959","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25959"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25959\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57964,"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25959\/revisions\/57964"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25959"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25959"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25959"},{"taxonomy":"vendor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/vendor?post=25959"},{"taxonomy":"product","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product?post=25959"},{"taxonomy":"attack_vector","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/attack_vector?post=25959"},{"taxonomy":"asset_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/asset_type?post=25959"},{"taxonomy":"severity","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/severity?post=25959"},{"taxonomy":"exploit_status","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ameeba.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/exploit_status?post=25959"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}