CVE-2026-15988

AI Engine <= 3.6.5 - Cross-Site Request Forgery to Privilege Escalation via REQUEST_URI Substring Match

2026-07-31 18:40
UKO

Strategic Overview

Status
Patched in 3.6.6
Affected Plugin
AI Engine – The Chatbot, AI Framework & MCP for WordPress
Affected Version
<= 3.6.5
CVSS
8.8High
Weakness type
CWE-352 · Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
CVE
CVE-2026-15988
View all AI Engine – The Chatbot, AI Framework & MCP for WordPress vulnerabilities

At a glance

CVE-2026-15988 is a high-severity Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in the AI Engine WordPress plugin, affecting versions <= 3.6.5. It carries a CVSS score of 8.8 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity; high confidentiality, integrity, availability impact). Exploitation requires no authentication. The issue is fixed in version 3.6.6; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed July 2026, reported by UKO.

Vulnerability Overview

The AI Engine – The Chatbot, AI Framework & MCP for WordPress plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Cross-Site Request Forgery in all versions up to, and including, 3.6.5 This is due to missing or incorrect nonce validation on the reauth_for_authorize function. This makes it possible for unauthenticated attackers to create new administrator accounts with attacker-supplied credentials via a CSRF-based REST authentication bypass, granted they can trick a site administrator into performing an action such as clicking on a link. This bypass can be combined with WordPress's ?_method=POST method-override support to convert a top-navigation GET request into an authenticated POST to the REST users endpoint, requiring no existing account on the attacker's part.

Technical Analysis

The vector marks this flaw as remotely reachable over the network, with low attack complexity — no special timing or configuration is needed, and no privileges on the target site. A successful exploit has high impact on confidentiality, integrity, availability — full site compromise territory.

CWE-352: Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)

Reaching this weakness in AI Engine <= 3.6.5 takes a caller who can reach the endpoint. Cross-site request forgery abuses the fact that browsers attach a victim's cookies to any request, so a state-changing action that only checks who you are, not whether you meant to act, can be triggered from another site.

An attacker who gets a logged-in user to load a crafted page can perform that action as them, with the impact scaling to whatever the victim's role is allowed to do. For AI Engine the fix is 3.6.6: builds <= 3.6.5 are affected, anything from 3.6.6 onward is not.

Remediation

Update to version 3.6.6, or a newer patched version

How does WordSec protect against this?

The attempt arrives as an ordinary request to AI Engine: WordSec's web application firewall inspects request payloads before WordPress loads them. None of that substitutes for the fix: AI Engine 3.6.6 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.

  • Firewall
  • Alerts

External References

https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-15988https://www.wordfence.com/threat-intel/vulnerabilities/id/45816c45-42bc-4163-b700-a1e913f32c97https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-15988

Related records

Vulnerability data © Defiant, Inc., provided under the Wordfence Intelligence T&C