Overview
CVE-2025-12752 is a medium severity vulnerability affecting the “Subscriptions & Memberships for PayPal” WordPress plugin, impacting versions up to and including 1.1.7. This security flaw allows unauthenticated attackers to create fake payment entries within the system, potentially leading to unauthorized access, service disruption, or financial manipulation.
Technical Details
The vulnerability stems from the plugin’s inadequate verification of the authenticity of Instant Payment Notification (IPN) requests received from PayPal. An IPN is a message service that PayPal uses to notify merchants of events related to PayPal transactions. Because the plugin doesn’t properly validate the source of these IPN requests, an attacker can craft and send malicious IPN data to the WordPress site. This crafted data is then processed by the plugin, leading to the creation of fraudulent payment records.
The vulnerable code is located within the `includes/public_ipn.php` file. Lack of proper authentication and validation mechanisms allows arbitrary data to be injected into the system via a forged IPN.
CVSS Analysis
The vulnerability has been assigned a CVSS score of 5.3 (Medium). The CVSS vector reflects the following characteristics:
- Attack Vector (AV): Network (N)
- Attack Complexity (AC): Low (L)
- Privileges Required (PR): None (N)
- User Interaction (UI): None (N)
- Scope (S): Unchanged (U)
- Confidentiality Impact (C): None (N)
- Integrity Impact (I): Low (L)
- Availability Impact (A): None (N)
This score indicates that the vulnerability can be exploited remotely with minimal effort and has a moderate impact on data integrity.
Possible Impact
Successful exploitation of this vulnerability could have several negative consequences:
- Fake Memberships/Subscriptions: Attackers can grant themselves or others access to premium content or services without paying.
- Service Disruption: A flood of fake payment entries could potentially overwhelm the system, leading to performance degradation or denial-of-service.
- Financial Discrepancies: Inaccurate payment records could cause confusion and errors in accounting and financial reporting.
- Reputational Damage: Exploitation of the vulnerability can damage the reputation of the website or business using the plugin.
Mitigation or Patch Steps
The primary mitigation strategy is to update the “Subscriptions & Memberships for PayPal” plugin to the latest available version. If an update is not immediately available, consider temporarily disabling the plugin until a patched version is released.
Specifically, versions *after* 1.1.7 contain a fix to properly validate the authenticity of IPN requests.
Steps to update the plugin:
- Log in to your WordPress admin dashboard.
- Navigate to the “Plugins” section.
- Locate the “Subscriptions & Memberships for PayPal” plugin.
- Click the “Update Now” button if an update is available.
After updating, monitor your site for any suspicious activity.
References
- CVE ID: CVE-2025-12752
- Plugin Source Code: plugins.trac.wordpress.org
- Code Change: plugins.trac.wordpress.org
- Wordfence Threat Intelligence: www.wordfence.com
