CVE-2026-108496 in User Manager Plugin
Summary
by MITRE • 10/13/2026
Missing Authorization vulnerability in WP User Manager WP User Manager wp-user-manager allows Exploiting Incorrectly Configured Access Control Security Levels.This issue affects WP User Manager: from n/a through 2.9.23.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 10/13/2026
The vulnerability identified within the WP User Manager plugin, specifically affecting versions up to and including 2.9.23, represents a critical failure in access control mechanisms that allows for unauthorized privilege escalation or data exposure. This flaw is categorized under CWE-862, which denotes Missing Authorization, indicating that the application fails to properly verify whether an authenticated user has the necessary permissions to perform specific actions on resources they do not own or are not authorized to manage. In the context of WordPress ecosystems, where role-based access control is fundamental to site integrity and security, such a deficiency undermines the core assumption that administrative functions remain restricted to users with elevated privileges. The vulnerability stems from an incorrect configuration of security levels within the plugin's logic, allowing attackers who possess valid credentials for lower-privileged roles, such as subscribers or contributors, to execute operations intended exclusively for administrators or editors.
From a technical perspective, this misconfiguration likely involves insufficient checks on server-side endpoints responsible for handling user management tasks, profile modifications, or role assignments. When an attacker interacts with these endpoints, the application fails to validate that the requesting session holds the requisite administrative rights before processing the request. This oversight enables malicious actors to manipulate HTTP requests to perform actions such as changing other users' roles, creating new administrator accounts, or modifying critical site settings without proper authentication checks at the authorization layer. The impact of this flaw is severe, as it effectively bypasses the intended security boundaries established by WordPress's default role hierarchy. An attacker can leverage this weakness to gain persistent administrative access, leading to full compromise of the website environment, including potential defacement, data exfiltration, or installation of further malicious payloads such as web shells or backdoors.
The operational impact extends beyond immediate site compromise, affecting the broader trust model of WordPress installations that rely on WP User Manager for extended user functionality. By exploiting this vulnerability, an attacker can escalate privileges from a low-level account to full administrative control, effectively taking over the entire website infrastructure. This aligns with ATT&CK technique T1078, Valid Accounts, as it involves using legitimate credentials obtained through phishing or credential stuffing attacks to perform unauthorized actions due to flawed authorization logic. Furthermore, this behavior correlates with MITRE CWE-269, Improper Privilege Management, highlighting the systemic failure in enforcing least privilege principles within the application's architecture. The ability to manipulate user roles and permissions allows for long-term persistence on the compromised system, making detection and remediation more challenging as standard monitoring tools may not flag actions performed by seemingly legitimate administrative accounts if they are created or modified through this exploit chain.
Mitigation strategies must prioritize immediate patching of the WP User Manager plugin to a version that resolves these access control deficiencies, ensuring that all role-based operations enforce strict authorization checks against the current user's capabilities. Administrators should also implement Web Application Firewalls (WAF) rules designed to detect anomalous patterns in administrative endpoint requests, particularly those originating from non-administrative sessions attempting to modify high-privilege resources. Additionally, enforcing multi-factor authentication for all administrator accounts adds a critical layer of defense against credential-based attacks that precede the exploitation of this authorization flaw. Regular security audits and code reviews focusing on access control lists are recommended to identify similar misconfigurations in other plugins or custom themes integrated with WordPress user management systems. Maintaining strict adherence to principle of least privilege ensures that even if one component is compromised, the blast radius remains contained within appropriate boundaries defined by robust role-based permissions.