WWordPress Vulnerability Database

Community Alert Authenticated XSS in WS Addons(CVE20258062)

WordPress WS Theme Addons plugin
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Plugin Name WS Theme Addons
Type of Vulnerability Authenticated Stored XSS
CVE Number CVE-2025-8062
Urgency Low
CVE Publish Date 2025-08-22
Source URL CVE-2025-8062

WS Theme Addons <= 2.0.0 — Authenticated (Contributor) Stored XSS via ws_weather Shortcode: Analysis, Impact and Practical Mitigations

Published: 22 August 2025   |   Reference: CVE-2025-8062

From the perspective of a Hong Kong-based security practitioner: this advisory explains the authenticated stored cross-site scripting (XSS) affecting the ws_weather shortcode in WS Theme Addons (≤ 2.0.0). The objective is practical, actionable guidance for site owners, administrators and developers operating in high-traffic or multi-contributor environments.

Note: the vulnerable component is the ws_weather shortcode. Authenticated users with Contributor privileges can persist JavaScript/HTML that is later rendered unsafely in visitors’ browsers.

Executive summary

  • Vulnerability: Authenticated Stored Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) via the ws_weather shortcode.
  • Affected versions: WS Theme Addons plugin ≤ 2.0.0.
  • Required privilege: Contributor (authenticated user).
  • CVE: CVE-2025-8062
  • Severity: Medium (public reporting references CVSS ≈ 6.5).
  • Immediate risk: Contributor accounts (or compromised contributor credentials) can inject payloads that execute in browsers of users viewing the affected content — administrators and editors are particularly at risk.
  • Official patch: none available at time of publication. Compensating controls or plugin removal are recommended until a vendor fix is issued.

Why this matters: realistic attack scenarios

Stored XSS persists malicious content in the site database (posts, widgets, shortcodes) and executes in a visitor’s browser. Specific to this issue:

  • A Contributor can create content using [ws_weather] with attributes or inner data that the plugin fails to sanitize.
  • The plugin outputs these values into front-end HTML without sufficient escaping, enabling script injection or event handler abuse (e.g., onmouseover, onclick).
  • Injected JavaScript runs with the site origin, enabling theft of session cookies (depending on cookie flags), CSRF-like actions, loading external resources, redirects, defacements, or further persistence.

Practical outcomes observed in the field:

  • An attacker who entices an administrator to view a poisoned page may obtain full site control (create admin users, upload backdoors).
  • Non-admin visitors can be redirected to drive-by downloads, phishing, or adware campaigns.
  • Automated scanners and bots frequently probe for shortcode-based injection points, so opportunistic mass exploitation is plausible.

Because Contributors are a low-privilege role commonly used for guest posts or community contributions, exposure is meaningful for many WordPress sites.

Immediate actions — prioritized checklist

The following steps are ordered by urgency and practicality for most administrators.

1. Immediate containment

  • Temporarily deactivate WS Theme Addons if the features are not essential. If disabling is not possible, proceed with virtual patching (see WAF rules below) and content review.
  • If the site allows open registrations, temporarily close registration or restrict to trusted domains while you review contributor accounts.

2. Review and quarantine Contributor accounts

  • Audit contributor accounts: last login, IPs, email addresses and recent activity.
  • Reset passwords for suspicious accounts and enforce 2FA for administrators (and where operationally feasible, for editors/contributors).
  • Remove or downgrade any untrusted contributors.

3. Search for injected content

Search the database for occurrences of the ws_weather shortcode to locate potentially malicious entries.

SELECT ID, post_title, post_type, post_status
FROM wp_posts
WHERE post_content LIKE '%[ws_weather%';

Also inspect wp_options, widgets and custom fields:

SELECT option_name, option_value
FROM wp_options
WHERE option_value LIKE '%[ws_weather%';

Use WP-CLI for larger sites:

wp db query "SELECT ID, post_title FROM wp_posts WHERE post_content LIKE '%[ws_weather%'" --skip-column-names

4. Review recent admin/editor activity

  • Check wp_posts for recently edited or published posts that include the shortcode.
  • If an administrator previewed a malicious post, consider session revocation and password resets for affected admins.

5. Clean or remove malicious entries

  • Manually review each candidate post before removal. Automated blind replacements can break content or miss encodings.
  • Export affected posts, clean offline, and re-import if you prefer to avoid in-place edits.

6. Scan for side-effects

  • Inspect wp-content/uploads for unexpected PHP or executable files.
  • Check wp_users for unauthorized admin accounts and examine wp_options and plugin tables for suspicious entries.
  • Run a file and database malware scan.

7. Monitor logs

  • Look for POST requests to /wp-admin/post.php, REST endpoints or admin-ajax.php containing ws_weather.
  • Retain backups and server logs for forensic analysis.

8. If plugin must remain active: virtual patching (WAF)

  • Deploy request-body inspection and rules that block attempts to save content containing ws_weather with script tags or event handlers.
  • Ensure rules target content-creation endpoints to minimise false positives on GET requests.

9. Plan for longer-term remediation

  • Replace the plugin or apply a vendor-supplied patch when one is available; validate fixes on staging before production rollout.
  • Adopt monitoring and review workflows to reduce likelihood of future similar exposures.

Detecting vulnerable or malicious usage: searches and indicators

Places to search:

  • wp_posts.post_content — posts/pages containing [ws_weather
  • Widgets and text widgets (often stored in wp_options)
  • Post meta (wp_postmeta) and Gutenberg blocks (serialized/JSON in post_content)
  • Revisions (post_type = 'revision')
  • Any AJAX or REST endpoints exposed by the plugin

Useful queries:

SELECT ID, post_type, post_status, post_date, post_author
FROM wp_posts
WHERE post_content LIKE '%[ws_weather%';
SELECT option_id, option_name
FROM wp_options
WHERE option_value LIKE '%[ws_weather%';
SELECT ID, post_parent, post_date
FROM wp_posts
WHERE post_type = 'revision' AND post_content LIKE '%[ws_weather%';

To search for suspicious attributes or inline scripts:

SELECT ID, post_title
FROM wp_posts
WHERE post_content REGEXP '<script[[:space:]]' OR post_content REGEXP 'on[a-zA-Z]+[[:space:]]*=' OR post_content LIKE '%javascript:%';

Note: REGEXP behaviour can vary by MySQL version; test on staging.

Containment: practical steps if the site is compromised

  • Immediately change all administrator passwords and other privileged accounts; notify email administrators as well.
  • Force logout for all active sessions (WP-CLI: wp user session destroy --all).
  • Rotate API keys and third-party integration secrets stored in options or plugin tables.
  • Create a forensics backup (files + DB snapshot) before making destructive changes.
  • Move suspicious files from wp-content/uploads offline for inspection; remove unexpected PHP files.
  • Delete unauthorized admin users and identify timeline/IPs from logs.
  • If you cannot confidently clean the site, restore from a known-good backup taken prior to the compromise.

When no vendor patch exists, virtual patching can block exploitation attempts at the HTTP layer. The examples below are conceptual and must be adjusted and tested on staging to avoid disrupting legitimate traffic.

Match context: focus on POSTs to administrative save endpoints (/wp-admin/post.php), REST/API endpoints, and plugin-specific AJAX calls.

Suggested rule logic:

  • Block POSTs that save post content containing ws_weather plus suspicious markers: <script, on[a-z]+=, javascript:.
  • Block or sanitize frontend rendering attempts that include embedded script constructs within the shortcode output.

Example mod_security-like pseudo-rule (conceptual):

SecRule REQUEST_URI "@rx /wp-admin/post.php$" "phase:2,chain,deny,log,msg:'Block ws_weather XSS attempt - post save',id:1001001,severity:2"
  SecRule ARGS_POST:post_content "(?i)\[ws_weather[^\]]*(

Generic detection regex:

(?i)\[ws_weather[^\]]*(

Conceptual Nginx+Lua approach:

Inspect POST bodies to /wp-admin/post.php. If body contains "[ws_weather" and also contains <script or event handler markers, return 403 or sanitize.

Front-end response-time protections:

  • If the WAF can modify responses, strip dangerous attributes from ws_weather output or replace the shortcode output with a safe placeholder.
  • Prefer blocking/sanitizing POSTs (creates/edits) rather than GETs to reduce false positives.
  • Log all blocked attempts for follow-up investigation.

If your WAF supports role-aware rules, apply stricter blocking to requests made by contributor accounts or to content-creation endpoints.

Code-level remediation guidance for plugin authors / maintainers

Plugin authors must treat all shortcode attributes and inner content as untrusted. The correct fix is to validate and escape output according to intended types.

  • Sanitize attributes using appropriate functions: esc_attr, esc_url, absint, floatval, sanitize_text_field.
  • When outputting HTML, use wp_kses() with a strict whitelist.
  • Never echo user-supplied HTML without a vetted wp_kses policy; prefer returning sanitized strings from shortcodes.
  • Use shortcode_atts() to normalize attributes and cast/validate each attribute.
  • Disallow event handler attributes and javascript: URIs in attributes.

Example safe shortcode skeleton:

function safe_ws_weather_shortcode($atts) {
    $defaults = array(
        'city' => '',
        'units' => 'metric',
    );
    $atts = shortcode_atts($defaults, $atts, 'ws_weather');

    $city = sanitize_text_field($atts['city']);
    $units = in_array($atts['units'], array('metric','imperial')) ? $atts['units'] : 'metric';

    $allowed_tags = array(
        'div' => array('class' => array(), 'id' => array()),
        'span' => array('class' => array()),
        'strong' => array(),
        'em' => array()
    );

    $output = '<div class="ws-weather">';
    $output .= '<span class="ws-city">' . esc_html($city) . '</span>';
    $output .= '</div>';

    return wp_kses($output, $allowed_tags);
}
add_shortcode('ws_weather', 'safe_ws_weather_shortcode');

Do not inject raw attribute values into HTML without proper escaping. Prefer returning content rather than using echo in shortcode handlers.

Remediation: manual cleaning examples

  1. Export affected posts (DB export or WP export) to a safe environment.
  2. Manually inspect post_content for malicious payloads.
  3. Remove or sanitize ws_weather shortcodes after manual review — avoid blind DB replaces.

Blunt DB replace example (use with extreme caution):

UPDATE wp_posts
SET post_content = REPLACE(post_content, '<script', '&lt;script')
WHERE post_content LIKE '%[ws_weather%';

Safer temporary neutralisation: add an mu-plugin that overrides the shortcode to prevent risky rendering while you clean content.

<?php
// mu-plugin: disable-ws-weather.php
add_action('init', function(){
    if (shortcode_exists('ws_weather')) {
        remove_shortcode('ws_weather');
    }
    add_shortcode('ws_weather', function($atts, $content = null){
        return '<div class="ws-weather-disabled">Weather shortcode disabled for security review.</div>';
    });
});
?>

Hardening recommendations (site-wide)

  • Enforce strong passwords and two-factor authentication for administrators; consider 2FA for editors and contributors where practical.
  • Minimise elevated privileges; confirm that Contributors need the ability to publish content that appears publicly without review.
  • Adopt a content review/publish workflow: require editor approval for Contributor content.
  • Keep WordPress core, themes and plugins up to date. Monitor CVE announcements for components you rely on.
  • Run file integrity monitoring and periodic site scans.
  • Use a restrictive Content Security Policy (CSP) to reduce XSS impact (test carefully to avoid breaking functionality):
Content-Security-Policy: default-src 'self'; script-src 'self' 'nonce-<RANDOM-NONCE>'; object-src 'none';

CSP can mitigate inline script execution but must be implemented with care.

Incident response playbook

  1. Isolate the site: remove from public DNS or restrict access via basic auth until you are confident the site is clean.
  2. Create a forensics backup (files + DB snapshot).
  3. Revoke active sessions and rotate credentials.
  4. Remove malicious content and rogue users; delete unauthorized files.
  5. Restore from a clean backup when available and verified.
  6. Redeploy with virtual patches in place while validating vendor fixes.
  7. Monitor logs intensively for 24–72 hours post-clean, and rescan.
  8. Report internally and to any external parties as required by policy or regulation.

How a WAF helps and what to expect from virtual patching

Virtual patching via a WAF provides an immediate layer of defence while waiting for an official plugin fix or completing remediation. A properly configured WAF can:

  • Block known exploitation attempts at the HTTP layer before they reach the application.
  • Neutralise dangerous inputs (strip or block inline scripts and event handlers within known shortcode payloads).
  • Apply role-aware rules (for example, stricter checks on Contributor save operations).
  • Provide logging to support forensic analysis and attacker identification.

When using a WAF, request these capabilities from whoever manages the WAF:

  • Request body inspection for admin save endpoints (post.php, admin-ajax.php, REST API).
  • Ability to create scoped rules targeting specific shortcodes or plugin endpoints.
  • Reporting and alerting for blocked attempts and suspicious activity.

Developer checklist to prevent shortcode XSS (summary)

  • Sanitize attributes: sanitize_text_field, esc_url_raw, absint, floatval.
  • Escape output: esc_html, esc_attr, and wp_kses for allowed HTML.
  • Whitelist tags/attributes when HTML output is required.
  • Avoid echoing attribute values directly into HTML without escaping.
  • Validate type and format for every attribute.
  • Use unit and integration tests to ensure shortcodes handle malicious input safely.

Administrator quick checklist

  • If the plugin is non-essential: deactivate it immediately.
  • If you must keep it: deploy WAF rules that block ws_weather content containing <script, on...=, or javascript: when saving content.
  • Search the database for [ws_weather and review all matches manually.
  • Audit Contributor accounts and restrict registrations.
  • Force password resets for administrative and any affected users.
  • Monitor logs for blocked attempts and suspicious IPs.

Final thoughts

Stored XSS vulnerabilities that are triggerable by contributor-level users are highly practical for attackers: they can bridge low-privilege accounts and high-impact compromise via social engineering and automated scanning. This specific shortcode-based issue merits rapid action: search the database for occurrences, remove or sanitize suspicious content, and apply virtual patching while awaiting a vendor-supplied fix.

If you require assistance, engage an experienced security professional or incident response team with WordPress expertise to help implement virtual patches, scan and clean affected sites, and validate fixes. In Hong Kong and the wider region, timely containment and careful forensic preservation are essential—preserve evidence, document timelines, and communicate with stakeholders.

Stay vigilant: treat untrusted content as hostile, reduce attack surface, and keep monitoring active.

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