Overview

On 13 December 2025 a disclosure recorded an unauthenticated HTML/content injection in the TI WooCommerce Wishlist plugin affecting versions up to and including 2.10.0. The plugin author released version 2.11.0 to address the issue.

From the perspective of a Hong Kong security practitioner: this vulnerability class is serious because it lets an unauthenticated actor inject HTML into content served from your legitimate domain. Although the reported CVSS score is moderate, the practical impacts — phishing content, SEO spam, client‑side attacks — can quickly damage trust and commercial operations.

This advisory explains the risk, step‑by‑step mitigation, detection tips, and controls you should apply immediately.

What is an unauthenticated HTML (content) injection?

Content injection means an attacker can insert HTML (and sometimes JavaScript) into pages or posts that the site serves to visitors. “Unauthenticated” means the attacker does not need to log in — exploitation is possible from the public internet.

Potential consequences include:

• Phishing pages that harvest credentials or payment data.
• SEO/Spam injection that creates hidden pages, affiliate links, or malicious redirects.
• Drive‑by downloads or client‑side attacks via injected scripts or iframes.
• Search engine penalties, blacklisting, and long‑term reputational damage.

Because malicious content is served from the site’s legitimate domain, users are more likely to trust it — which increases the impact considerably.

Vulnerability summary: TI WooCommerce Wishlist (≤2.10.0)

• Software: TI WooCommerce Wishlist (WordPress plugin)
• Affected versions: ≤ 2.10.0
• Fixed in: 2.11.0
• Type: Unauthenticated HTML / Content Injection
• Attack vector: HTTP (unauthenticated)
• CVE: CVE-2025-9207
• Disclosure date: 13 Dec 2025

In short: an unauthenticated actor can submit crafted requests that result in HTML being stored or displayed within site content or pages, enabling content manipulation without valid credentials.

Technical analysis — how an attacker can abuse this vulnerability

The following is a high‑level technical description to help defenders understand typical mechanics behind content injection issues:

1. Input accepted without proper sanitization/escaping

   The plugin exposes an endpoint or form parameter that accepts user supplied text. Server‑side code fails to sanitize or escape HTML, or incorrectly uses functions that allow tags through.

2. Stored vs. reflected

   This is a stored/content injection scenario — malicious content persists and is shown to any user visiting an affected page. Stored injections are more serious because they persist across caching and are indexed by search engines.

3. Entry points

   Wishlist features typically accept item titles, notes, descriptions, or custom text fields — common entry points. Attackers may target wishlist creation or publicly accessible AJAX endpoints.

4. Escalation vectors

   Injected content can include HTML that loads external resources, iframes, forms, or minimal JavaScript (depending on output context). Even without <script> tags, attackers can craft forms or links to conduct phishing.

5. No authentication required

   Because the endpoint is reachable without authorization, attackers can automate mass submissions to populate content across many sites using the vulnerable plugin.

Realistic impact scenarios

Consider how your site operates and which scenarios apply:

• Small WooCommerce shop: Hidden forms mimicking checkout to harvest card details; wishlist pages used for SEO spam, reducing conversions.
• Enterprise eCommerce or marketplace: Malicious content indexed by search engines; customers redirected to fraudulent payment pages — legal and reputational exposure.
• Membership/training site: Injected scripts attempt to steal session tokens or cookies, enabling account takeover.
• Informational/blog site: SEO spam and thin pages linking to malicious domains; possible delisting by search engines.

Immediate actions (0–24 hours)

If you manage or host WordPress sites with TI WooCommerce Wishlist installed, take these steps immediately:

1. Update the plugin

   Update TI WooCommerce Wishlist to version 2.11.0 or later. This is the definitive fix. If update cannot be applied immediately due to compatibility or staging policies, follow the temporary mitigations below.

2. Take a snapshot / backup

   Before making changes, take a full backup (files + database). This preserves evidence and allows rollback if needed.

3. Enable virtual patching via your security layer

   If you operate a web application firewall or similar control, deploy rules to block suspicious requests targeting wishlist endpoints or requests containing obvious HTML payload markers (e.g. <script, <iframe, onerror=, javascript:).

4. Deactivate the plugin temporarily

   If updating is not possible, deactivate TI WooCommerce Wishlist to stop the vulnerable code from executing. This will affect wishlist functionality but reduces immediate risk.

5. Alert stakeholders

   Inform site owners, customers, and internal teams about the mitigation steps and expected impact.

6. Monitor logs

   Increase logging to capture suspicious POST/GET requests against wishlist endpoints and look for payloads attempting to insert HTML.

Detection & investigation: what to look for

After applying urgent mitigations, run a targeted investigation to determine if you were exploited.

A. Search content for injected HTML

Typical injection markers (search for these in post content and meta):

• <script
• <iframe
• onerror=
• javascript:
• Suspicious external domains
• Hidden forms (<form> with display:none or offscreen CSS)

Examples (SQL) — adapt to your DB prefix and always backup before running:

-- MySQL example (adapt wp_ prefix if different)
SELECT ID, post_title, post_status
FROM wp_posts
WHERE post_content LIKE '%<script%' OR post_content LIKE '%<iframe%' OR post_content LIKE '%javascript:%' LIMIT 100;

SELECT meta_id, post_id, meta_key, meta_value
FROM wp_postmeta
WHERE meta_value LIKE '%<script%' OR meta_value LIKE '%<iframe%';

B. Audit recent posts, pages, custom post types

Sort by post_date and inspect recent content for anomalies. Look for newly created pages, posts, or entries in wishlist templates.

C. Check uploads and file system

Search for recently modified PHP, HTML, or suspicious files in the web root:

find /path/to/site -type f -mtime -14 -iname '*.php' -o -iname '*.html' -o -iname '*.js' | less

D. Logs and traffic analysis

Examine webserver logs for POST or AJAX requests to the plugin endpoints. Identify IPs sending many requests; look for unusual user agents or high request rates.

E. Integrity checks

If you maintain file integrity monitoring or version control for plugin files, check for unexpected modifications.

F. Malware and blacklist scanner

Run comprehensive malware scans with the tools you use to identify flagged content and connected indicators (IPs, domains).

Containment & remediation (if you are compromised)

If you detect injected content or active exploitation, follow this containment and remediation plan:

1. Isolate

   Place the site into maintenance mode or temporarily take it offline to stop distribution of malicious content.

2. Quarantine malicious content

   Remove or neutralize injected HTML from posts/pages. Replace with clean content or restore from a known good backup if available. If immediate removal is not possible, block specific URLs at the webserver level.

3. Rotate credentials

   Reset all WordPress admin passwords, database credentials, API keys, and any other credentials that might be exposed. Force password resets for elevated accounts.

4. Rebuild or restore

   If file system compromise is suspected, prefer a clean restore from a verified backup and reinstall themes/plugins from official sources.

5. Remove persistent backdoors

   Search for backdoors in plugin/theme folders, mu-plugins, uploads, and wp-config.php. Common persistence locations are the uploads directory and plugin/theme root folders.

6. Search for phishing artifacts

   Remove attacker domains/scripts and submit re‑review requests to search engines and anti‑phishing providers if your site was used for credential harvesting.

7. Hardening after remediation

   Apply updates (plugin, theme, WP core), remove unused plugins, change salts, and ensure file permissions are correct. Re-enable monitoring and scan again to confirm the site is clean.

8. Incident reporting and disclosure

   If customer data was exposed, follow legal and regulatory obligations for notification. Document remediation steps and perform a post‑mortem.

Long‑term mitigation and best practices

Reduce future risk by adopting these practices:

• Keep everything up to date: Automate plugin and core updates where feasible, or implement a strict patching policy with staging tests.
• Inventory and remove unused plugins: Fewer third‑party components means a smaller attack surface.
• Least privilege: Limit accounts to required roles and avoid shared admin credentials.
• Harden endpoints: Disable unused AJAX endpoints or restrict access with authentication where possible.
• Use a security layer for virtual patching: Deploy rules to block known exploit payloads while you apply vendor patches.
• Content Security Policy (CSP): Implement a strict CSP to limit where scripts and frames can be loaded from. CSP is defence‑in‑depth and not a substitute for server fixes.
• Monitoring and alerting: Alert on unusual requests, spikes in POSTs to plugin endpoints, file changes, and new admin users.
• Regular scanning and code review: Schedule scans for known vulnerabilities and review code for custom plugins/themes.
• Staging and test upgrades: Test upgrades in staging before production deployment to avoid delays in patching.
• Incident response plan: Maintain tested runbooks and a communications plan for customer or stakeholder notifications.

Recommended WAF rules and examples

Below are generalized examples of WAF rules or signatures to use as virtual patches while applying the official plugin update. Adapt to your environment and syntax (mod_security, Nginx, AWS WAF, etc.). These are defensive heuristics — tune to reduce false positives and always test in monitoring mode first.

Conceptual rule — block requests containing obvious HTML tags in parameters

• Condition:
  • Request METHOD == POST or GET
  • Request URI contains “wishlist” or known plugin endpoints (e.g., /?wishlist= or admin-ajax.php with action related to the plugin)
  • Any parameter value matches regex: (<script|<iframe|onerror=|javascript:)
• Action: Block / return 403

mod_security (conceptual)

SecRule REQUEST_URI "@rx wishlist|ti_wishlist|ti-wishlist" "phase:2,deny,id:10001,msg:'Block potential content injection targeting wishlist plugin',t:none,t:lowercase,chain"
SecRule ARGS|ARGS_NAMES|REQUEST_BODY "@rx (<script|<iframe|onerror\s*=|javascript:)" "t:none,log"

Nginx + Lua (conceptual)

if ($request_uri ~* "wishlist|ti_wishlist") {
  if ($request_body ~* "(<script|<iframe|onerror=|javascript:)") {
    return 403;
  }
}

Additional measures

• Monitor admin-ajax.php requests for action values used by the plugin and block payloads containing HTML.
• Rate limit POST requests to wishlist endpoints per IP to reduce mass automated injections.
• Temporarily block or challenge high‑risk IPs or ranges observed sending many suspicious requests.

Note: Test rules in detection/logging mode before blocking to avoid disrupting legitimate users. Keep backups of rule sets and deploy iteratively.

Monitoring and follow‑up

After remediation:

• Monitor for at least 30 days for re‑injection attempts.
• Track repeated hits from the same IPs; add confirmed malicious sources to blocklists carefully.
• Consider weekly site scans and monthly plugin inventory reviews.

For organisations managing multiple sites, automate scanning for vulnerable plugin versions, schedule staged updates, and maintain a rollback plan.

Frequently asked questions

Q: If I updated to 2.11.0, do I still need to scan my site?

A: Yes. Updating fixes the code going forward but does not remove malicious content that may already have been injected. Perform detection and cleanup as described above.

Q: My site doesn’t use wishlists on the front end — do I need to worry?

A: If the plugin is installed and active, it may still expose endpoints that attackers can target. If you don’t need the plugin, remove it; otherwise apply the update.

Q: Does this vulnerability allow remote code execution?

A: The primary issue is content/HTML injection. Injected HTML can host JavaScript leading to credential theft or client‑side attacks. In chained scenarios this could contribute to a wider compromise.

Q: Can a WAF fully protect me?

A: A WAF is an effective mitigation and virtual patching layer that can prevent many exploitation attempts, but it is not a substitute for applying vendor patches. Use both controls where possible.

Appendix — helpful commands and queries

Useful commands for investigation (run in read‑only mode and take backups first):

1. Grep-like search in uploads and themes for script tags

   grep -R --line-number --exclude-dir=cache --exclude-dir=node_modules -E "<script|<iframe|javascript:" /var/www/site

2. WP-CLI search for content

   wp db query "SELECT ID, post_title FROM wp_posts WHERE post_content LIKE '%<script%' OR post_content LIKE '%<iframe%' OR post_content LIKE '%javascript:%' LIMIT 200;"

3. Find recently modified files (14 days)

   find /path/to/site -type f -mtime -14 -print

4. List recent admin users (example)

   wp user list --role=administrator --format=csv

Always run queries against a copy if possible and take full backups before making changes.