CVE-2024-13553

SMS Alert Order Notifications – WooCommerce <= 3.7.9 - Unauthenticated Account Takeover/Privilege Escalation

2025-03-31 00:00
Lucio Sá

Strategic Overview

Status
Patched in 3.8.0
Affected Plugin
SMS Alert – SMS & OTP for WooCommerce, Order Notifications & Abandoned Cart Recovery
Affected Version
<= 3.7.9
CVSS
9.8Critical
Weakness type
CWE-288 · Authentication Bypass Using an Alternate Path or Channel
CVE
CVE-2024-13553
View all SMS Alert – SMS & OTP for WooCommerce, Order Notifications & Abandoned Cart Recovery vulnerabilities

At a glance

CVE-2024-13553 is a critical-severity Authentication Bypass Using an Alternate Path or Channel vulnerability in the SMS Alert WordPress plugin, affecting versions <= 3.7.9. 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 3.8.0; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed March 2025, reported by Lucio Sá.

Vulnerability Overview

The SMS Alert Order Notifications – WooCommerce plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to privilege escalation via account takeover in all versions up to, and including, 3.7.9. This is due to the plugin using the Host header to determine if the plugin is in a playground environment. This makes it possible for unauthenticated attackers to spoof the Host header to make the OTP code "1234" and authenticate as any user, including administrators.

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-288: Authentication Bypass Using an Alternate Path or Channel

Reaching this weakness in SMS Alert <= 3.7.9 takes no account at all. Authentication bypass through an alternate path means the application has a second route to a protected action that skips the checks the primary route performs.

The protection on the main path becomes irrelevant, because the attacker simply uses the route that never asks. For SMS Alert the fix is 3.8.0: builds <= 3.7.9 are affected, anything from 3.8.0 onward is not.

Remediation

Update to version 3.8.0, or a newer patched version

How does WordSec protect against this?

This one needs no account at all, which puts it outside what login hardening can reach; WordSec's login security narrows the account-level paths around it, and the firewall is what inspects the request itself. None of that substitutes for the fix: SMS Alert 3.8.0 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.

  • Login Security
  • Alerts

External References

https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2024-13553https://www.wordfence.com/threat-intel/vulnerabilities/id/4e444a30-11c5-4219-b4fe-635084cbac3ahttps://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2024-13553

Related records

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