CVE intelligence and bounded remediation

CVE-2024-12172 — WP Courses LMS security vulnerability

High CVSS 7.5

The WP Courses LMS – Online Courses Builder, eLearning Courses, Courses Solution, Education Courses plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to unauthorized access due to a missing capability check on the wpc_update_user_meta_option() function in all versions up to, and including, 3.2.21. This makes it possible for authenticated attackers, with Subscriber-level access and above, to update arbitrary user's metadata which can be levereged to block an administrator from accessing their site when wp_capabilities is set to 0.

Severity
High
CVSS
7.5 (3.1)
Published
2024-12-12
CISA KEV
Not currently listed
Ecosystem
php/wordpress
Weaknesses
CWE-862

Affected products

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Matched remediation archetype

Authorization bypass, IDOR, and cross-tenant access

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Check exposure

  • Map object and action authorization checks across API, UI, batch, import/export, and background-job paths.
  • Identify tenant, ownership, role, and policy boundaries for affected resources and administrative operations.
  • Use synthetic fixtures to compare intended access matrices without accessing another user's real data.

Remediate safely

  • Enforce server-side authorization at each resource access and state transition using the authenticated principal and trusted tenant context.
  • Scope data queries by tenant and ownership; treat client-supplied identifiers, roles, and policy claims as untrusted.
  • Add deny-by-default policy tests for horizontal and vertical access across every affected transport.

Authoritative sources

Complete CVE record and remediation plan

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