CVE-2023-7195 is a medium-severity vulnerability classified as CWE-352, which corresponds to Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF). This vulnerability affects the WP-Reply Notify WordPress plugin, specifically versions up to 1.1. The core issue is the absence of a CSRF token or any other form of CSRF protection when updating the plugin's settings. As a result, an attacker can craft a malicious web request that, when visited by an authenticated WordPress administrator, could cause unauthorized changes to the plugin's configuration without the admin's consent or knowledge. The vulnerability does not require the attacker to have any privileges or prior authentication, but it does require the targeted user to be logged in as an admin and to interact with the malicious request (user interaction). The CVSS 3.1 base score is 4.3, indicating a medium severity level, with the vector AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N. This means the attack can be performed remotely over the network with low attack complexity, no privileges required, but user interaction is necessary. The impact is limited to integrity (unauthorized changes to plugin settings) without affecting confidentiality or availability. No known exploits are currently reported in the wild, and no patches or updates have been linked yet. The vulnerability was published on May 15, 2025, and was reserved earlier in 2024. Since the WP-Reply Notify plugin is used within WordPress environments, the attack surface is limited to websites running this plugin version. The lack of CSRF protection is a common security oversight in web applications, and this vulnerability highlights the importance of implementing anti-CSRF tokens or similar mechanisms in administrative interfaces.

For European organizations, the impact of this vulnerability depends largely on the extent to which they use the WP-Reply Notify plugin on their WordPress sites. If exploited, an attacker could manipulate plugin settings, potentially altering notification behaviors or other configurations that could disrupt normal site operations or be leveraged as part of a broader attack chain (e.g., to facilitate phishing or social engineering by changing notification content). Although the vulnerability does not directly expose sensitive data or cause denial of service, unauthorized configuration changes can undermine trust in the website's integrity and lead to indirect reputational damage. Organizations relying on WordPress for customer-facing websites, intranets, or content management could face operational disruptions or compliance issues if such unauthorized changes go undetected. Given that the attack requires an authenticated admin user to interact with a malicious request, the risk is somewhat mitigated by user awareness and good security hygiene, but remains a concern especially in environments with multiple administrators or less stringent user training.

1. Immediate mitigation involves restricting administrative access to trusted users only and enforcing strong authentication mechanisms such as multi-factor authentication (MFA) to reduce the risk of compromised admin accounts. 2. Administrators should avoid clicking on suspicious links or visiting untrusted websites while logged into WordPress admin panels. 3. Implement Content Security Policy (CSP) headers to limit the domains from which scripts can be loaded, reducing the risk of CSRF attacks. 4. Monitor and audit plugin settings regularly to detect unauthorized changes promptly. 5. Since no patch is currently linked, organizations should consider temporarily disabling the WP-Reply Notify plugin or replacing it with alternative plugins that have proper CSRF protections until an official fix is released. 6. Web application firewalls (WAFs) can be configured to detect and block suspicious POST requests that do not contain valid CSRF tokens or originate from unexpected sources. 7. Educate administrators about the risks of CSRF and safe browsing practices when logged into sensitive systems. 8. Follow up with the plugin vendor or community for updates and patches addressing this vulnerability and apply them as soon as they become available.