CVE-2024-37451: Travel Agency WordPress Theme CSRF Flaw

CVE-2024-37451 Overview

CVE-2024-37451 is a Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in the Rarathemes Travel Agency WordPress theme. The flaw affects all versions up to and including 1.4.9. The issue is tracked under CWE-352 and carries a CVSS 3.1 base score of 8.8.

An attacker can craft a malicious web page that forces an authenticated administrator's browser to submit unintended state-changing requests to the WordPress site. Successful exploitation impacts confidentiality, integrity, and availability of the affected site.

Critical Impact

An attacker who tricks an authenticated WordPress administrator into visiting a malicious page can perform privileged actions on the Travel Agency theme without consent.

Affected Products

• Rarathemes Travel Agency WordPress theme versions up to and including 1.4.9
• WordPress sites running the vulnerable Travel Agency theme
• Administrator and privileged user sessions on affected installations

Discovery Timeline

• 2025-01-02 - CVE-2024-37451 published to the National Vulnerability Database
• 2026-04-23 - Last updated in NVD database

Technical Details for CVE-2024-37451

Vulnerability Analysis

The Travel Agency theme exposes one or more state-changing actions that do not validate the origin of incoming requests. The theme accepts authenticated POST or GET actions without verifying a WordPress nonce or checking the Referer and Origin headers. This allows an attacker to forge requests that the victim's browser submits while carrying a valid session cookie.

Exploitation requires user interaction, typically through phishing or a malicious advertisement, and targets an authenticated session. Because the affected user is usually an administrator, the attacker inherits full theme-level privileges during the forged request. The EPSS score for this issue is approximately 0.171% as of June 2026.

Root Cause

The root cause is the absence of CSRF protection on theme handlers, classified under [CWE-352]. WordPress provides the wp_nonce_field() and check_admin_referer() primitives to mitigate this class of issue, and the affected handlers in Travel Agency through 1.4.9 either omit these checks or implement them incorrectly. Any action reachable through the theme that modifies settings or data is therefore exposed to forged cross-origin submissions.

Attack Vector

The attacker hosts a page that triggers an HTTP request to the vulnerable WordPress site. When an authenticated administrator visits the page, the browser sends the request along with valid authentication cookies. The vulnerable handler processes the request because no nonce or origin validation occurs. Detailed technical analysis is available in the Patchstack WordPress Vulnerability database.

Detection Methods for CVE-2024-37451

Indicators of Compromise

• Unexpected modifications to Travel Agency theme settings or options in the WordPress database
• Inbound POST requests to theme endpoints with Referer or Origin headers pointing to external domains
• Administrator account activity originating from sessions with suspicious referrers in access logs
• New or altered content, redirects, or configuration changes that administrators did not initiate

Detection Strategies

• Review web server access logs for state-changing requests to Travel Agency theme paths where the Referer header is missing or external
• Correlate WordPress audit logs with browser session metadata to identify forged actions executed under administrator accounts
• Compare current theme option values against known-good baselines stored in the wp_options table

Monitoring Recommendations

• Enable a WordPress activity logging plugin and forward events to a centralized SIEM for retention and correlation
• Alert on administrative changes to theme settings outside of approved maintenance windows
• Monitor for outbound phishing campaigns targeting site administrators and other privileged users

How to Mitigate CVE-2024-37451

Immediate Actions Required

• Update the Travel Agency theme to a version later than 1.4.9 once the vendor publishes a fixed release
• Audit administrator accounts and rotate session cookies and passwords if compromise is suspected
• Restrict administrator browsing on the WordPress dashboard host to trusted sites only

Patch Information

The Patchstack advisory tracks the vulnerability against Travel Agency theme versions through 1.4.9. Site operators should consult the Patchstack advisory for the latest fixed version and apply the upgrade through the WordPress theme updater.

Workarounds

• Deactivate the Travel Agency theme until a patched version is installed
• Deploy a web application firewall (WAF) rule that blocks state-changing requests to theme endpoints when the Origin or Referer header does not match the site domain
• Enforce multi-factor authentication for administrator accounts to reduce the value of a hijacked session
• Apply the principle of least privilege so that day-to-day editing uses non-administrator roles

# Example WAF rule (ModSecurity) to block cross-origin POSTs to wp-admin
SecRule REQUEST_METHOD "@streq POST" \
  "id:1003745,phase:1,deny,status:403,\
   chain,msg:'Block cross-origin POST to wp-admin (CVE-2024-37451)'"
  SecRule REQUEST_URI "@beginsWith /wp-admin/" \
    "chain"
    SecRule REQUEST_HEADERS:Origin "!@beginsWith https://your-site.example" \
      "t:none"