Administrator escalation via unchecked profile role update
Published Jan 4, 2021 · Updated Aug 4, 2024
Privilege escalation in Ultimate Member before 2.1.12 allows remote authenticated users to obtain Administrator access through profile updates. The profile_update function treats is_admin() as authorization and passes an attacker-controlled um-role value to set_role without checking user capabilities. Access to wp-admin/profile.php is required; successful exploitation grants control of the affected WordPress site.
Summary
What happened
Privilege escalation in Ultimate Member before 2.1.12 allows remote authenticated users to obtain Administrator access through profile updates. The profile_update function treats is_admin() as authorization and passes an attacker-controlled um-role value to set_role without checking user capabilities. Access to wp-admin/profile.php is required; successful exploitation grants control of the affected WordPress site.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2020-36156
- Published
- Jan 4, 2021
- Updated
- Aug 4, 2024
- Vendor
- Unknown vendor
- Product
- Unknown product
- Classifications
- CWE-269, T1098
- Attack vector
- network
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Jan 4, 2021CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Aug 4, 2024Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
Present is not the same as exploitable
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Is a vulnerable build present?
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Affected products and versions are unavailable in this record.
Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.
Public exploit references
- Authenticated profile-update privilege-escalation proof of conceptproof of concept · unverified
Labels summarize the accepted research assessment. They do not indicate a test against your environment.
Technologies
Your stack
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Your stack
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