CVE-2026-104022
MediumCVSS 5.4Exploitation Probability (EPSS)
Low risk2th percentile - higher than 2% of all known CVEs
Summary
The Academy LMS plugin for WordPress up to version 4.0.3 contains a privilege escalation vulnerability. The `add_child()` function assigns the `academy_student` role to any existing account based on the attacker-supplied `email` parameter before validating the guardian-ward relationship, and fails to roll back the role assignment when validation returns an error. This allows authenticated attackers with the `academy_guardian` role or higher to elevate any existing account, including their own, to the `academy_student` role, gaining `edit_posts` (Contributor-equivalent) capabilities and, when the student file-upload setting is enabled, `upload_files` (Author-equivalent) capabilities.
Risk Assessment
The risk is that guardians can escalate their own or other accounts' privileges, potentially leading to unauthorized content modifications and file uploads in WordPress, compromising data integrity and confidentiality.
Recommendation
It is recommended to immediately update the Academy LMS plugin to a version newer than 4.0.3 if available, and restrict the `academy_guardian` role to trusted users. Also, audit user roles for any unauthorized changes.
Other vulnerabilities in Academy LMS
See all- CVE-2026-9341Medium
The Academy LMS plugin for WordPress up to version 3.8.0 is vulnerable to Insecure Direct Object Reference (IDOR) in the 'save_lesson_note', 'get_lesson_note', and 'complete_lesson_video' AJAX handlers due to missing validation on a user-controlled key. This allows authenticated attackers with Subscriber-level access or higher to read, overwrite, or delete private lesson notes of any other user (including administrators) and falsify lesson-completion progress for arbitrary users.
- CVE-2026-104915Medium
The Academy LMS plugin for WordPress up to version 4.0.3 is vulnerable to authorization bypass due to the plugin not properly verifying that a user is authorized to perform an action. Authenticated attackers with custom-level access can permanently delete arbitrary Academy lesson comments and their replies authored by any user, including administrators, across courses they do not instruct. The vulnerability is exploitable by any user registered as an Academy instructor for at least one course, as they can supply their own course_id to pass the instructor check while targeting comments belonging to entirely different courses.
- CVE-2026-12376Medium
The Academy LMS WordPress plugin through 3.8.2 does not restrict access to quiz attempt records to their owner, allowing any authenticated user with subscriber-level access and above (enrolled in any single course) to read every user's quiz attempts across the whole site, including personal data such as IP addresses, names, registration dates and quiz results.
- CVE-2026-5348Medium
The Academy LMS WordPress plugin up to version 3.8.1 is vulnerable to Insecure Direct Object Reference (IDOR) in the '/topics' REST API endpoint. Lack of permission checks allows unauthenticated attackers to access detailed course data, including private, draft, scheduled, or password-protected courses.
- CVE-2025-68527Medium
The Academy LMS plugin up to version 3.4.0 contains a Stored Cross-site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability that allows an attacker to inject a persistent script into the website.
- CVE-2025-12098Medium
The Academy LMS – WordPress LMS Plugin for Complete eLearning Solution up to version 3.3.8 is vulnerable to sensitive information exposure via the 'enqueue_social_login_script' function. Unauthenticated attackers can extract sensitive data including the Facebook App Secret if Facebook Social Login is enabled.
- CVE-2023-4119Medium
A vulnerability has been found in Academy LMS 6.0 that leads to cross site scripting attacks. The issue affects unknown code in the file /academy/home/courses, and manipulation of the argument query/sort_by allows for remote attacks.
Original NVD description (English source)
The Academy LMS – AI Course Builder, Quizzes, Certificates & eLearning plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Privilege Escalation in all versions up to, and including, 4.0.3. This is due to the `add_child()` function calling `add_role('academy_student')` on any existing account resolved from the attacker-supplied `email` parameter before `Store::link()` validates the guardian-ward relationship, and failing to roll back that role write when `Store::link()` returns a `WP_Error`. This makes it possible for authenticated attackers with the `academy_guardian` role or higher to elevate any existing WordPress account — including their own — to the `academy_student` role, gaining `edit_posts` (Contributor-equivalent) capabilities and, when the student file-upload setting is enabled, `upload_files` (Author-equivalent) capabilities not granted to the guardian role. When a guardian supplies their own email address, `email_exists()` resolves to their own user ID, causing `Store::link()` to reject the self-link, but because the `add_role()` call has already executed and is never reversed, the academy_student role grant on their own account persists permanently.
Vulnerability data from NVD (NIST) · CISA KEV · EPSS