The vulnerability identified as CVE-2025-11888 affects the ShopEngine Elementor WooCommerce Builder Addon – All in One WooCommerce Solution plugin for WordPress, versions up to and including 4.8.4. The root cause is an incorrect authorization (CWE-863) due to insufficient capability checks in the plugin’s post_deactive() and post_activate() functions. These functions handle license activation and deactivation processes but fail to properly verify whether the authenticated user has the necessary permissions to perform these actions. As a result, any user with Editor-level access or higher can activate or deactivate licenses, actions which should be restricted to administrators or equivalent roles. The vulnerability has a CVSS v3.1 base score of 2.7, indicating low severity, with the vector AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N. This means the attack can be performed remotely over the network, requires low attack complexity, but demands high privileges (Editor or above), no user interaction is needed, and the impact is limited to integrity (modification of license status) without affecting confidentiality or availability. No public exploits or patches have been reported at the time of publication. The vulnerability could be exploited to manipulate license states, potentially disrupting plugin features or causing unauthorized license usage, but it does not directly compromise sensitive data or system availability.

For European organizations, the impact of this vulnerability is primarily related to the integrity of license management within WooCommerce environments using the affected plugin. Unauthorized license activation or deactivation could lead to operational disruptions, such as loss of plugin functionality or unauthorized use of licensed features, which may affect e-commerce operations. While the vulnerability does not expose confidential data or cause denial of service, misuse could result in financial or reputational damage if license abuse is detected or if e-commerce services are interrupted. Organizations with multiple Editors or delegated content managers may face increased risk if role assignments are not tightly controlled. The low CVSS score and requirement for Editor-level access reduce the likelihood of widespread exploitation, but targeted attacks within compromised environments remain possible. Given WooCommerce’s popularity in European e-commerce, organizations relying on this plugin should be vigilant to prevent unauthorized privilege escalation and license manipulation.

To mitigate this vulnerability, European organizations should implement the following specific measures: 1) Immediately audit and restrict WordPress user roles, ensuring that Editor-level access is granted only to trusted personnel and that unnecessary privileges are minimized. 2) Monitor license activation and deactivation logs for unusual or unauthorized activity to detect potential exploitation attempts. 3) Apply principle of least privilege by reviewing and tightening capability assignments related to plugin management. 4) Stay informed about vendor updates and apply patches promptly once released to address the authorization flaw. 5) Consider implementing additional access control mechanisms such as two-factor authentication for users with elevated privileges to reduce risk of account compromise. 6) Use security plugins or web application firewalls that can detect and block suspicious requests targeting license management endpoints. 7) Educate administrators and editors about the risks of privilege misuse and enforce strict change management policies for plugin configurations. These targeted actions go beyond generic advice by focusing on role management, monitoring, and proactive patching specific to this vulnerability.