CVE Catalog

CVE-2026-15992

HighCVSS 8.8
Published: Updated: Translated: NVD NIST

Exploitation Probability (EPSS)

Low risk
0.27%

20th percentile - higher than 20% of all known CVEs

Summary

The WP Password Policy plugin for WordPress up to version 3.7.1 is vulnerable to Privilege Escalation due to missing authorization checks and nonce verification in the get_user() function. An authenticated attacker with subscriber-level access can escalate their privileges to Administrator by submitting a crafted POST request.

Risk Assessment

An attacker with low privileges can gain full control over the WordPress installation, potentially leading to site takeover and data access.

Recommendation

Immediately update the WP Password Policy plugin to the latest patched version.

Related vulnerabilities

Original NVD description (English source)

The WP Password Policy plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Privilege Escalation in all versions up to and including 3.7.1. This is due to missing authorization checks and nonce verification in the `get_user()` function of the `Module_Password_Hint` class, which unconditionally calls `WP_User::set_role()` with the attacker-supplied `role` parameter on any account resolved via `$_POST['user_login']`, without confirming the requesting user holds the capability to assign roles. This makes it possible for authenticated attackers, with subscriber-level access and above, to escalate their own privileges to Administrator by submitting a crafted POST request — with `action` set to `createuser` and `role` set to `administrator` — to the password-reset form endpoint. The vulnerable code path is reachable via the `password_hint` filter hooked during the WordPress password-reset form render, meaning an attacker need only possess a valid password-reset cookie to reach the sink.

Vulnerability data from NVD (NIST) · CISA KEV · EPSS