CVE-2024-11351 Overview
CVE-2024-11351 is a sensitive information exposure vulnerability in the Restrict plugin for WordPress. The plugin, which enforces membership, site, content, and user access restrictions, is affected in all versions up to and including 2.2.8. The flaw exists in how the plugin interacts with the WordPress core search feature. Unauthenticated attackers can extract sensitive content from posts restricted to higher-level roles such as administrator. The issue is tracked under CWE-200: Exposure of Sensitive Information to an Unauthorized Actor.
Critical Impact
Unauthenticated attackers can read excerpts of restricted posts by abusing the WordPress search endpoint, bypassing role-based access controls enforced by the plugin.
Affected Products
- Restrict – membership, site, content and user access restrictions plugin for WordPress
- All versions up to and including 2.2.8
- WordPress sites relying on the plugin for role-based content restriction
Discovery Timeline
- 2024-12-11 - CVE-2024-11351 published to NVD
- 2026-06-17 - Last updated in NVD database
Technical Details for CVE-2024-11351
Vulnerability Analysis
The Restrict plugin gates access to posts based on user roles and membership levels. The plugin filters direct requests to restricted posts, but it does not filter results returned by the WordPress core search feature. When a user submits a search query, the WordPress search handler returns matching posts along with excerpts and titles regardless of the Restrict plugin's access rules. This gap allows unauthenticated visitors to enumerate restricted content by issuing crafted search queries.
The vulnerability is limited to information disclosure. There is no impact on integrity or availability, and no authentication or user interaction is required to trigger it. Attackers can iterate through keywords or wordlists to harvest sensitive text from posts intended only for administrators or paid members.
Root Cause
The root cause is missing access control enforcement on search query results. The plugin hooks into direct post retrieval but omits the pre_get_posts or equivalent filter that would exclude restricted post IDs from search result sets. As a result, the WordPress core search index treats restricted posts as visible to any visitor.
Attack Vector
Exploitation occurs over the network against the public-facing WordPress site. An attacker submits a search request such as https://target.example/?s=<keyword> and inspects the returned titles and excerpts. Fixes are documented in the WordPress plugin changeset 3201494 and the Wordfence vulnerability report.
Detection Methods for CVE-2024-11351
Indicators of Compromise
- Elevated volumes of unauthenticated requests to the WordPress search endpoint with the ?s= parameter.
- Search requests iterating through keyword lists or dictionary terms from a small set of source IP addresses.
- Web server access logs showing 200 responses to /?s= queries referencing terms that appear only in restricted posts.
Detection Strategies
- Inventory WordPress sites and identify installations of the Restrict plugin at version 2.2.8 or earlier.
- Review web application firewall logs for repeated search queries from unauthenticated sessions.
- Correlate anonymous search traffic with known restricted post titles to identify probable exfiltration attempts.
Monitoring Recommendations
- Enable verbose access logging on the WordPress front controller and retain logs long enough to support retrospective analysis.
- Alert on anomalous rates of ?s= query strings from single source addresses or user agents.
- Track plugin version drift across managed WordPress fleets to detect vulnerable installations.
How to Mitigate CVE-2024-11351
Immediate Actions Required
- Update the Restrict plugin to a version later than 2.2.8 that incorporates the fix from changeset 3201494.
- Audit restricted posts for sensitive data that may have been exposed prior to patching.
- Rotate any credentials, tokens, or internal references contained in restricted posts if exposure is suspected.
Patch Information
The vendor addressed the issue in the plugin repository. Review the WordPress plugin changeset 3201494 for the applied code changes and upgrade all affected sites through the WordPress plugin update mechanism. The Wordfence advisory provides additional remediation context.
Workarounds
- Disable the WordPress core search feature on sites that rely on Restrict for content gating until the plugin is updated.
- Add a pre_get_posts filter in a mu-plugin to exclude restricted post types from search queries for non-privileged users.
- Deploy a web application firewall rule to block unauthenticated ?s= search requests to affected sites during the patch window.
# Update the Restrict plugin using WP-CLI
wp plugin update restricted-content
wp plugin get restricted-content --field=version
Disclaimer: This content was generated using AI. While we strive for accuracy, please verify critical information with official sources.