CVE-2025-52795: WP Front User Submit CSRF Vulnerability

CVE-2025-52795 Overview

CVE-2025-52795 is a Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability affecting the WP Front User Submit / Front Editor WordPress plugin developed by aharonyan. This vulnerability allows attackers to craft malicious requests that can trick authenticated users into performing unintended actions on their behalf within the WordPress administrative interface.

CSRF vulnerabilities are particularly dangerous in WordPress plugins as they can lead to unauthorized modifications of site settings, content manipulation, or privilege escalation when an authenticated administrator visits a malicious page.

Critical Impact

Attackers can exploit this CSRF vulnerability to perform unauthorized actions on behalf of authenticated WordPress users, potentially leading to site compromise, unauthorized content changes, or administrative account manipulation.

Affected Products

• WP Front User Submit / Front Editor plugin versions up to and including 5.0.6
• WordPress installations with the front-editor plugin activated
• All WordPress versions compatible with the affected plugin versions

Discovery Timeline

• 2025-06-20 - CVE-2025-52795 published to NVD
• 2026-04-15 - Last updated in NVD database

Technical Details for CVE-2025-52795

Vulnerability Analysis

This Cross-Site Request Forgery vulnerability exists due to missing or improper nonce verification in the WP Front User Submit / Front Editor plugin. The plugin fails to adequately validate that requests to sensitive functions originate from legitimate user sessions, allowing attackers to forge requests that execute with the victim's authentication context.

The vulnerability is classified under CWE-352 (Cross-Site Request Forgery), which describes a class of weaknesses where a web application does not sufficiently verify that a well-formed, valid, consistent request was intentionally provided by the user who submitted it.

Root Cause

The root cause of this vulnerability stems from inadequate CSRF protection mechanisms in the plugin's request handling. WordPress provides built-in nonce (number used once) verification functions such as wp_verify_nonce() and check_admin_referer() that developers should implement to protect against CSRF attacks. The affected versions of the WP Front User Submit / Front Editor plugin either omit these security checks entirely or implement them incorrectly on one or more endpoints.

Attack Vector

An attacker can exploit this vulnerability by creating a malicious web page or email containing specially crafted HTML that, when visited by an authenticated WordPress user with the vulnerable plugin active, will silently submit requests to the target WordPress site. These requests execute with the victim's session privileges, potentially allowing the attacker to:

• Modify plugin settings or configurations
• Submit or alter front-end content
• Change user permissions or roles
• Perform other administrative actions depending on the specific unprotected endpoints

The attack requires no authentication from the attacker's perspective—only that the victim is currently logged into their WordPress site and visits the attacker-controlled page.

Detection Methods for CVE-2025-52795

Indicators of Compromise

• Unexpected changes to plugin settings or configurations without administrator action
• Unauthorized content submissions or modifications appearing in the WordPress database
• Web server access logs showing POST requests to front-editor plugin endpoints from external referrers
• User reports of strange behavior after visiting external websites while logged into WordPress

Detection Strategies

• Review web server access logs for requests to /wp-admin/ or plugin-specific endpoints with unexpected or missing referrer headers
• Implement Web Application Firewall (WAF) rules to detect and block requests with suspicious cross-origin patterns
• Monitor WordPress audit logs for configuration changes that don't correlate with legitimate administrator activity
• Deploy SentinelOne Singularity for real-time endpoint monitoring and anomaly detection

Monitoring Recommendations

• Enable comprehensive WordPress audit logging to track all plugin-related configuration changes
• Configure alerts for administrative actions performed outside of normal operational hours
• Implement referrer validation at the web server level as an additional defense layer
• Regularly review the WP Front User Submit / Front Editor plugin settings for unauthorized modifications

How to Mitigate CVE-2025-52795

Immediate Actions Required

• Update the WP Front User Submit / Front Editor plugin to a patched version as soon as one becomes available
• Temporarily deactivate the plugin if it is not critical to site operations until a patch is released
• Implement a Web Application Firewall with CSRF protection rules
• Educate WordPress administrators about the risks of visiting untrusted sites while logged in
• Review and audit any recent changes made through the plugin for unauthorized modifications

Patch Information

A security patch addressing this CSRF vulnerability should be obtained from the plugin developer. Administrators should monitor the Patchstack Vulnerability Report for updated remediation guidance and patch availability.

Until an official patch is released, consider implementing the workarounds below to reduce exposure.

Workarounds

• Deactivate the WP Front User Submit / Front Editor plugin temporarily if it is not essential to site functionality
• Implement strict Content Security Policy (CSP) headers to limit cross-origin requests
• Use a WAF solution to filter potentially malicious cross-site requests
• Log out of WordPress administrative sessions before browsing external websites
• Consider using browser extensions that isolate sessions between tabs

# WordPress CLI command to deactivate the vulnerable plugin
wp plugin deactivate front-editor

# Verify plugin status
wp plugin status front-editor

# List all active plugins for audit
wp plugin list --status=active