CVE-2025-14352: WordPress Hotel Booking Auth Bypass Flaw

CVE-2025-14352 Overview

The Awesome Hotel Booking plugin for WordPress contains an authorization bypass vulnerability in the room-single.php shortcode handler. This security flaw allows unauthenticated attackers to modify arbitrary booking records due to the plugin's improper reliance on nonce verification without implementing proper capability checks. The vulnerability affects all versions of the plugin up to and including version 1.0.

Critical Impact

Unauthenticated attackers can manipulate booking data by obtaining a nonce from the publicly accessible booking form, potentially disrupting hotel operations and compromising customer reservations.

Affected Products

• Awesome Hotel Booking plugin for WordPress version 1.0 and earlier
• WordPress sites using the vulnerable plugin's room-single shortcode
• Any booking records processed through the affected shortcode handler

Discovery Timeline

• 2026-01-07 - CVE-2025-14352 published to NVD
• 2026-01-08 - Last updated in NVD database

Technical Details for CVE-2025-14352

Vulnerability Analysis

This vulnerability represents a classic Broken Access Control (CWE-863) issue where the plugin developers mistakenly assumed that nonce verification alone provides sufficient security. While WordPress nonces serve as CSRF protection tokens, they are not designed to verify user permissions or capabilities. The vulnerable code in room-single.php at line 67 processes booking modification requests after validating only the nonce, without checking whether the requesting user has the appropriate WordPress capabilities to perform such modifications.

The fundamental flaw lies in the assumption that possessing a valid nonce equates to authorization. In WordPress, nonces can be exposed through various means, including being embedded in publicly rendered HTML forms. An attacker visiting the public booking form can easily extract a valid nonce and use it to craft malicious requests that modify booking records.

Root Cause

The root cause is the absence of capability checks in the shortcode handler. WordPress provides functions like current_user_can() to verify user permissions, but the plugin relies exclusively on wp_verify_nonce() for security validation. This architectural oversight allows any user—including unauthenticated visitors—who can obtain a valid nonce to bypass the intended access controls and manipulate booking data directly.

Attack Vector

The attack can be executed over the network without any authentication. An attacker simply needs to:

1. Visit the public booking form page to obtain a valid nonce from the page source
2. Craft a malicious HTTP request targeting the room-single shortcode handler
3. Include the extracted nonce along with modified booking parameters
4. Submit the request to alter booking records without any authentication

The vulnerability is particularly concerning because the nonce is intentionally exposed on public-facing pages as part of the booking form functionality. This means attackers don't need to perform any sophisticated techniques to obtain the token required to exploit this flaw.

Detection Methods for CVE-2025-14352

Indicators of Compromise

• Unexpected modifications to booking records without corresponding administrative actions
• Unusual HTTP POST requests to pages containing the room-single shortcode from external or anonymous sources
• Log entries showing booking data changes without authenticated user sessions
• Multiple booking modification requests originating from the same IP address in short timeframes

Detection Strategies

• Implement Web Application Firewall (WAF) rules to monitor POST requests targeting the vulnerable shortcode endpoint
• Enable WordPress activity logging to track all booking modifications and correlate with user authentication status
• Configure intrusion detection systems to alert on suspicious patterns of booking data manipulation
• Review server access logs for requests containing booking modification parameters from unauthenticated sessions

Monitoring Recommendations

• Enable comprehensive logging for all booking-related database operations
• Set up alerts for booking modifications that occur outside normal business workflows
• Monitor for bulk or automated requests targeting the booking functionality
• Implement anomaly detection for booking data changes that lack corresponding administrative audit trails

How to Mitigate CVE-2025-14352

Immediate Actions Required

• Disable the Awesome Hotel Booking plugin until a patched version is available
• Review all booking records for unauthorized modifications since the plugin was installed
• Implement server-side access controls or WAF rules to restrict access to the vulnerable endpoint
• Consider using an alternative hotel booking solution with proper authorization controls

Patch Information

As of the last NVD update on 2026-01-08, no official patch has been released for this vulnerability. Website administrators should monitor the WordPress Plugin Repository and the Wordfence Vulnerability Report for updates on available fixes.

Workarounds

• Temporarily deactivate the plugin and use manual booking management processes
• Implement a WordPress mu-plugin that adds capability checks before the shortcode handler executes
• Use .htaccess or server configuration to restrict POST requests to affected pages to authenticated administrators only
• Deploy a WAF rule to block requests containing booking modification parameters from unauthenticated sessions

# Apache .htaccess workaround to restrict POST requests
# Add to the WordPress root .htaccess file
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_METHOD} POST
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} /booking-page/ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_COOKIE} !wordpress_logged_in
RewriteRule .* - [F,L]
</IfModule>