CVE-2025-47517 is a high-severity Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability identified in the WordPress plugin 'Accept Donations with PayPal' developed by Scott Paterson, affecting versions up to 1.4.5. The vulnerability enables an attacker to perform unauthorized actions on behalf of an authenticated user without their consent by exploiting the lack of proper CSRF protections. Specifically, this vulnerability can lead to Stored Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) attacks, where malicious scripts are permanently injected into the plugin's data storage and subsequently executed in the context of users visiting the affected site. The CVSS 3.1 base score of 7.1 reflects the network attack vector (AV:N), low attack complexity (AC:L), no privileges required (PR:N), but requiring user interaction (UI:R). The scope is changed (S:C), indicating that the vulnerability affects resources beyond the vulnerable component itself. The impact affects confidentiality, integrity, and availability to a limited extent (C:L, I:L, A:L). Although no known exploits are currently reported in the wild, the presence of stored XSS combined with CSRF significantly increases the risk of session hijacking, unauthorized transactions, or defacement. The absence of available patches at the time of publication necessitates immediate attention from administrators using this plugin to mitigate potential exploitation. The vulnerability arises due to insufficient validation of requests and lack of anti-CSRF tokens, allowing attackers to craft malicious requests that victims may unknowingly execute, leading to persistent malicious code execution within the plugin's operational context.

For European organizations, especially those operating websites or platforms that accept donations via PayPal using this plugin, the impact can be substantial. Exploitation could lead to unauthorized donation transactions, theft of user session data, or defacement of donation pages, undermining user trust and potentially causing financial loss. Stored XSS can facilitate phishing attacks targeting donors or administrators, leading to credential theft or further compromise. Given the plugin's role in handling financial transactions, even limited integrity or availability impacts can disrupt fundraising activities. Additionally, organizations subject to GDPR must consider the implications of data breaches resulting from such vulnerabilities, potentially leading to regulatory penalties and reputational damage. The risk is heightened for non-technical users who may be more susceptible to social engineering or inadvertent interaction with malicious payloads. The absence of known exploits in the wild suggests a window for proactive mitigation, but the high severity score mandates urgent remediation efforts to prevent exploitation.

1. Immediate action should include disabling or removing the 'Accept Donations with PayPal' plugin until a security patch is released. 2. Monitor official vendor channels and security advisories for updates or patches addressing CVE-2025-47517. 3. Implement Web Application Firewall (WAF) rules to detect and block suspicious CSRF and XSS payloads targeting donation endpoints. 4. Conduct a thorough audit of donation-related transaction logs to identify any anomalous activities potentially linked to exploitation attempts. 5. Educate site administrators and users on the risks of interacting with unsolicited or suspicious links that could trigger CSRF attacks. 6. Employ Content Security Policy (CSP) headers to mitigate the impact of stored XSS by restricting script execution sources. 7. Review and enhance overall site security posture by ensuring all plugins and themes are regularly updated and by enforcing least privilege principles for user roles managing donations. 8. Consider implementing multi-factor authentication (MFA) for administrative accounts to reduce the risk of session hijacking. 9. If possible, isolate donation processing functions or migrate to alternative, well-maintained plugins with robust security track records.