VulnerabilityPublished 22 Sep 2025

CVE-2025-9487: Admin and Site Enhancements (ASE) (WordPress plugin) · Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)

Affects Admin and Site Enhancements (ASE) (WordPress plugin)Source CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 4.7 Medium.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 10:12 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score

4.7Medium

How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.

EPSS: 0.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 14% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:L

Attack Vector: Network
Attack Complexity: Low
Privileges Required: High
User Interaction: None
Scope: Unchanged
Confidentiality: Low
Integrity: Low
Availability: Low

Bold values are the worst case: easiest to exploit or largest impact.

Attack Vector: Network: The vulnerable component is bound to the network stack and the set of possible attackers extends beyond the other options listed, up to and including the entire Internet. Such a vulnerability is often termed 'remotely exploitable' and can be thought of as an attack being exploitable at the protocol level one or more network hops away (e.g., across one or more routers).
Attack Complexity: Low: Specialized access conditions or extenuating circumstances do not exist. An attacker can expect repeatable success against the vulnerable component.
Privileges Required: High: The attacker is authorized with (i.e., requires) privileges that provide significant (e.g., administrative) control over the vulnerable component that could affect component-wide settings and files.
User Interaction: None: The vulnerable system can be exploited without any interaction from any user.
Scope: Unchanged: An exploited vulnerability can only affect resources managed by the same security authority. In this case, the vulnerable component and the impacted component are either the same, or both are managed by the same security authority.
Confidentiality: Low: There is some loss of confidentiality. Access to some restricted information is obtained, but the attacker does not have control over what information is obtained, or the amount or kind of loss is limited. The information disclosure does not cause a direct, serious loss to the impacted component.
Integrity: Low: Modification of data is possible, but the attacker does not have control over the consequence of a modification, or the amount of modification is limited. The data modification does not have a direct, serious impact on the impacted component.
Availability: Low: Performance is reduced or there are interruptions in resource availability. Even if repeated exploitation of the vulnerability is possible, the attacker does not have the ability to completely deny service to legitimate users. The resources in the impacted component are either partially available all of the time, or fully available only some of the time, but overall there is no direct, serious consequence to the impacted component.

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v3.1 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 22 Sep 2025
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by Mirage: no evidence on record.
No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 26 Oct 2026.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, or CISA SSVC or the CVSS exploit maturity reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

What to do

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
Admin and Site Enhancements (ASE)	Affected =0	Fixed in–

AI-suggested

European organizations should take the following specific actions: 1) Immediately audit WordPress installations to identify the presence and version of the ASE plugin and confirm if xmlrpc.php uploads are enabled. 2) Disable SVG uploads via xmlrpc.php if not strictly necessary, or disable xmlrpc.php entirely if unused, as it is a common attack vector. 3) Update the ASE plugin to version 7.9.8 or later as soon as it becomes available to ensure proper sanitization of SVG files. 4) Implement strict access controls and monitoring for users with high privileges to detect suspicious upload activities. 5) Employ Web Application Firewalls (WAFs) with rules to detect and block malicious SVG payloads or anomalous xmlrpc.php requests. 6) Conduct regular security training to reduce the risk of credential compromise for privileged users. 7) Monitor logs for unusual activity related to SVG uploads or xmlrpc.php access. These targeted measures go beyond generic advice by focusing on the specific attack vector and plugin involved.

Description

The Admin and Site Enhancements (ASE) WordPress plugin before 7.9.8 does not sanitise SVG files when uploaded via xmlrpc.php when such uploads are enabled, which could allow users to upload a malicious SVG containing XSS payloads

Impact

For European organizations, this vulnerability poses a moderate risk, especially for those relying on WordPress sites with the ASE plugin installed and xmlrpc.php enabled for remote uploads. Exploitation could lead to unauthorized script execution, data leakage, or site defacement, impacting brand reputation and user trust. Given the widespread use of WordPress across Europe for corporate, governmental, and e-commerce websites, the vulnerability could be leveraged to target sensitive information or disrupt services. Organizations in sectors such as finance, healthcare, and public administration, which often have strict data protection requirements under GDPR, could face compliance issues if an attack leads to data breaches. Additionally, the requirement for authenticated high-privilege users limits the attack surface but does not eliminate risk, as insider threats or compromised credentials could facilitate exploitation. The vulnerability could also be chained with other exploits to escalate privileges or pivot within networks, increasing potential damage.

CWE-79Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') (opens in a new tab)
Base weaknessLikelihood of exploit: HighCWE Top 25 (2025): #1OWASP Top 10 A05:2025: Injection (opens in a new tab)
The product does not neutralize or incorrectly neutralizes user-controllable input before it is placed in output that is used as a web page that is served to other users.
Architecture and Design · Libraries or Frameworks
Use a vetted library or framework that does not allow this weakness to occur or provides constructs that make this weakness easier to avoid.
Implementation · Architecture and Design
Understand the context in which your data will be used and the encoding that will be expected. This is especially important when transmitting data between different components, or when generating outputs that can contain multiple encodings at the same time, such as web pages or multi-part mail messages.
Architecture and Design · Implementation · Attack Surface Reduction
Understand all the potential areas where untrusted inputs can enter your software: parameters or arguments, cookies, anything read from the network, environment variables, reverse DNS lookups, query results, request headers, URL components, e-mail, files, filenames, databases, and any external systems that provide…
OWASP Cheat Sheets
Cross Site Scripting Prevention (opens in a new tab)
DOM based XSS Prevention (opens in a new tab)
Injection Prevention (opens in a new tab)
Abuse Case (opens in a new tab)
Deserialization (opens in a new tab)
OWASP ASVS 4.0.3
V5.3.3 (opens in a new tab)
V1.5.1 (opens in a new tab)
Attack patterns
XSS Using MIME Type Mismatch (opens in a new tab)
DOM-Based XSS (opens in a new tab)
Reflected XSS (opens in a new tab)
Stored XSS (opens in a new tab)
Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) (opens in a new tab)
From MITRE CWE, MITRE CAPEC and OWASP (Top 10, OpenCRE).

References

wpscan.com/vulnerability/b957b7c4-7a7c-497e-b8e4-499c821fb1b0/ (opens in a new tab)

Community reviews

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 22 Sep 2025, 16:24 UTC

WeaknessesCWE-79

Technical details

References

Community reviews

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