Institutions Directory <= 1.3.4 - Authenticated (Subscriber+) Privilege Escalation
Strategic Overview
- Status
- Unpatched
- Affected Plugin
- Institutions Directory
- Affected Version
<= 1.3.4- CVSS
- 8.8High
- Weakness type
- CWE-266 · Incorrect Privilege Assignment
- CVE
CVE-2025-69182
At a glance
CVE-2025-69182 is a high-severity Incorrect Privilege Assignment vulnerability in the Institutions Directory WordPress plugin, affecting versions <= 1.3.4. It carries a CVSS score of 8.8 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity; high confidentiality, integrity, availability impact). Exploitation requires an authenticated account at Subscriber level or above. No fixed release has been reported yet; treat installations running this software as exposed. Disclosed January 2026, reported by Phat RiO.
Vulnerability Overview
The Institutions Directory plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Privilege Escalation in all versions up to, and including, 1.3.4. This makes it possible for authenticated attackers, with Subscriber-level access and above, to elevate their privileges to that of an administrator.
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 interaction from a victim user. A successful exploit has high impact on confidentiality, integrity, availability — full site compromise territory.
CWE-266: Incorrect Privilege Assignment
A product incorrectly assigns a privilege to a particular actor, creating an unintended sphere of control for that actor.
Remediation
No known patch available. Please review the vulnerability's details in depth and employ mitigations based on your organization's risk tolerance. It may be best to uninstall the affected software and find a replacement.
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. No patched version is recorded yet, which is the case where a filtering layer matters most, because there is nothing to update to.
- Login Security
- Alerts
External References
Related records
Same weakness class
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