CVE-2022-42888

ARMember Premium <= 5.5.1 - Privilege Escalation

2022-12-01 00:00

Strategic Overview

Status: Patched in 5.6
Affected Plugin: ARMember Premium – Membership Plugin, Content Restriction, Member Levels, User Profile & User signup
Affected Version: <= 5.5.1
CVSS: 9.8Critical
Weakness type: CWE-269 · Improper Privilege Management
CVE: CVE-2022-42888

View all ARMember Premium – Membership Plugin, Content Restriction, Member Levels, User Profile & User signup vulnerabilities

At a glance

CVE-2022-42888 is a critical-severity Improper Privilege Management vulnerability in the ARMember Premium WordPress plugin, affecting versions <= 5.5.1. It carries a CVSS score of 9.8 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity; high confidentiality, integrity, availability impact). Exploitation requires no authentication. The issue is fixed in version 5.6; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed December 2022, reported by Dave Jong.

Vulnerability Overview

The ARMember Premium plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Authorization Bypass in versions up to, and including, 5.5.1. This makes it possible for unauthenticated attackers to elevate their own privileges with the potential to take over a site.

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, and no interaction from a victim user. A successful exploit has high impact on confidentiality, integrity, availability — full site compromise territory.

CWE-269: Improper Privilege Management

Reaching this weakness in ARMember Premium <= 5.5.1 takes a caller who can reach the endpoint. Improper privilege management means the code lets an account end up with capabilities its role should not have.

It converts a low-privileged account into an administrative one, which makes every other restriction on the site irrelevant. For ARMember Premium the fix is 5.6: builds <= 5.5.1 are affected, anything from 5.6 onward is not.

Remediation

Update to version 5.6, or a newer patched version

How does WordSec protect against this?

Because it turns on account access, WordSec's login security is the relevant layer: role-based two-factor, captcha and brute-force limits raise the cost of getting the account this needs. None of that substitutes for the fix: ARMember Premium 5.6 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.

Login Security
Alerts

External References

https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2022-42888 https://www.wordfence.com/threat-intel/vulnerabilities/id/8950b98d-7e7d-4cad-bb3d-d7a5d8edbdf5 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2022-42888

Related records

Other vulnerabilities in ARMember Premium – Membership Plugin, Content Restriction, Member Levels, User Profile & User signup

CVSS Vector

9.8

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Base

Attack VectorNetwork
Attack ComplexityLow
Privileges RequiredNone
User InteractionNone
ScopeUnchanged
ConfidentialityHigh
IntegrityHigh
AvailabilityHigh

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