CVE-2025-0177
Published: 08 March 2025
Description
Adversaries may exploit software vulnerabilities in an attempt to elevate privileges.
Security Summary
CVE-2025-0177 is a privilege escalation vulnerability affecting the Javo Core plugin for WordPress in all versions up to and including 3.0.0.080. The flaw stems from the plugin permitting users registering new accounts to arbitrarily set their own user role, bypassing standard WordPress access controls. This issue has been assigned CWE-269 (Improper Privilege Management) and carries a CVSS v3.1 base score of 9.8 (AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H), indicating critical severity due to its network accessibility and high impact on confidentiality, integrity, and availability.
Unauthenticated attackers can exploit this vulnerability remotely with low complexity and no user interaction required. By simply registering a new account and specifying the administrator role during the process, attackers gain elevated privileges, enabling full control over the affected WordPress site, including data exfiltration, modification, or deletion.
Mitigation details are outlined in vendor advisories, including the update history on the ThemeForest page for the Javo Directory WordPress theme at https://themeforest.net/item/javo-directory-wordpress-theme/8390513#item-description__update-history and the Wordfence threat intelligence report at https://www.wordfence.com/threat-intel/vulnerabilities/id/7d636768-37b4-4343-9028-30e7b1f997f2?source=cve. Security practitioners should update to a patched version beyond 3.0.0.080 and review user registrations for unauthorized admin accounts.
Details
- CWE(s)
Affected Products
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques
Why these techniques?
Remote unauthenticated privilege escalation in public-facing WordPress plugin directly enables T1190 (Exploit Public-Facing Application) for initial access and T1068 (Exploitation for Privilege Escalation) to gain admin rights.