CVE-2025-12095 identifies a Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in the Simple Registration for WooCommerce plugin for WordPress, affecting all versions up to and including 1.5.8. The vulnerability stems from the absence of nonce validation in the role requests admin page handler located in includes/display-role-admin.php. Nonce validation is a critical security measure that prevents unauthorized commands from being executed by ensuring that requests originate from legitimate users. Without this protection, an attacker can craft a malicious request that, when an authenticated administrator clicks a link or visits a page, causes the server to approve pending role requests. This action effectively escalates user privileges by granting unauthorized roles, potentially administrative rights, to attacker-controlled accounts. The attack vector requires no prior authentication by the attacker but does require user interaction from an administrator, such as clicking a malicious link. The vulnerability impacts the confidentiality of data by enabling unauthorized access, the integrity by allowing unauthorized privilege changes, and availability by potentially disrupting normal administrative functions. The CVSS v3.1 score of 8.8 reflects the high impact and relatively low complexity of exploitation, with no privileges required and only user interaction needed. Although no known exploits have been reported in the wild, the vulnerability poses a significant risk to WordPress sites using this plugin, especially those handling sensitive e-commerce transactions or customer data.

For European organizations, this vulnerability poses a substantial risk to e-commerce platforms running WooCommerce with the affected plugin. Successful exploitation can lead to unauthorized privilege escalation, allowing attackers to manipulate user roles, potentially gaining administrative access. This can result in unauthorized data access, modification, or deletion, undermining customer trust and violating data protection regulations such as GDPR. The integrity of transaction records and user data can be compromised, leading to financial losses and reputational damage. Availability may also be affected if attackers disrupt administrative operations or lock out legitimate administrators. Given the widespread use of WooCommerce in Europe’s e-commerce sector, particularly among small and medium-sized enterprises, the vulnerability could have broad implications. Organizations with high administrative activity and those lacking strict access controls are particularly vulnerable. Additionally, attackers could leverage this vulnerability as a foothold for further attacks within the network.

Immediate mitigation should focus on restricting administrative access to trusted personnel and networks, employing multi-factor authentication (MFA) for all administrator accounts to reduce the risk of compromised credentials. Administrators should be trained to recognize phishing attempts and avoid clicking on suspicious links. Since no official patch is currently available, organizations can implement manual nonce validation in the affected plugin code by adding WordPress nonce checks to the role request handlers to ensure requests are legitimate. Monitoring administrative actions and logs for unusual role approvals can help detect exploitation attempts early. Employing Web Application Firewalls (WAFs) configured to detect and block CSRF attack patterns can provide an additional layer of defense. Organizations should also maintain regular backups of their WordPress sites and databases to enable recovery in case of compromise. Finally, organizations should subscribe to vendor and security advisories to promptly apply patches once released.