CVE-2023-32125
📋 TL;DR
This Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in the Daniel Powney Multi Rating WordPress plugin allows attackers to trick authenticated administrators into performing unintended actions. Attackers can create malicious web pages that, when visited by logged-in administrators, can modify plugin settings or perform other administrative actions without consent. This affects all WordPress sites running Multi Rating plugin version 5.0.6 or earlier.
💻 Affected Systems
- WordPress Multi Rating plugin by Daniel Powney
📦 What is this software?
Multi Rating by Danielpowney
⚠️ Risk & Real-World Impact
Worst Case
An attacker could completely compromise the WordPress site by tricking an administrator into changing critical settings, installing malicious plugins, or granting administrative privileges to the attacker.
Likely Case
Attackers modify plugin settings to disrupt functionality, inject malicious content, or change rating behaviors to manipulate site content.
If Mitigated
With proper CSRF protections and administrator awareness, the risk is limited to isolated configuration changes that can be reverted.
🎯 Exploit Status
CSRF attacks are well-understood and easy to implement. Exploitation requires social engineering to get administrators to visit malicious pages.
🛠️ Fix & Mitigation
✅ Official Fix
Patch Version: 5.0.7 or later
Vendor Advisory: https://patchstack.com/database/vulnerability/multi-rating/wordpress-multi-rating-plugin-5-0-6-cross-site-request-forgery-csrf
Restart Required: No
Instructions:
1. Log into WordPress admin panel. 2. Navigate to Plugins > Installed Plugins. 3. Find 'Multi Rating' plugin. 4. Click 'Update Now' if available. 5. Alternatively, download version 5.0.7+ from WordPress.org and manually update.
🔧 Temporary Workarounds
Disable Plugin
allTemporarily disable the Multi Rating plugin until patched
wp plugin deactivate multi-rating
Implement CSRF Protection
allAdd CSRF tokens to WordPress forms using security plugins
🧯 If You Can't Patch
- Implement strict access controls limiting administrative access to trusted networks only
- Educate administrators about CSRF risks and safe browsing practices
🔍 How to Verify
Check if Vulnerable:
Check WordPress admin panel > Plugins > Multi Rating > Version. If version is 5.0.6 or lower, you are vulnerable.Check Version:
wp plugin get multi-rating --field=versionVerify Fix Applied:
After updating, verify version shows 5.0.7 or higher in WordPress admin plugins page.📡 Detection & Monitoring
Log Indicators:
- Unexpected plugin setting changes
- Administrative actions from unusual IP addresses
- Multiple failed CSRF token validations
Network Indicators:
- POST requests to wp-admin/admin-ajax.php without proper referrer headers
- Requests containing multi-rating plugin parameters from external domains
SIEM Query:
source="wordpress.log" AND ("multi-rating" OR "mr_" OR "mrp_") AND ("action=update" OR "action=save")