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Vulnerability record · CVE-2016-6897 · published 18 January 2017

CVE-2016-6897: Wordpress cross-site request forgery vulnerability

Wordpress · Wordpress

Cross-site request forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in the wp_ajax_update_plugin function in wp-admin/includes/ajax-actions.php in WordPress before 4.6 allows remote attackers to hijack the authentication of subscribers for /dev/random read operations by leveraging a late call to the check_ajax_referer function, a related issue to CVE-2016-6896.

6.5 CVSS 3.0 Medium EPSS 29% · top 1.9% CWE-352 · Cross-site request forgery
6.5CVSS 3.0 base score, v2 4.3
29%EPSS exploitation probability, 30 days
NoNot in CISA KEV
1Affected product versions listed by NVD
14References
17 Jun 2026Last modified by NVD

Description

Cross-site request forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in the wp_ajax_update_plugin function in wp-admin/includes/ajax-actions.php in WordPress before 4.6 allows remote attackers to hijack the authentication of subscribers for /dev/random read operations by leveraging a late call to the check_ajax_referer function, a related issue to CVE-2016-6896.

CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N

Affected products

1 vulnerable configurations from NVD's CPE data, grouped by vendor and product.

References

LinkTags
http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2016/08/20/1
http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/92572
http://www.securitytracker.com/id/1036683
https://github.com/WordPress/WordPress/commit/8c82515ab62b88fb32d01c9778f0204b296f3568
https://sumofpwn.nl/advisory/2016/path_traversal_vulnerability_in_wordpress_core_ajax_handlers.html
https://wpvulndb.com/vulnerabilities/8606
https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/40288/
http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2016/08/20/1
http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/92572
http://www.securitytracker.com/id/1036683
https://github.com/WordPress/WordPress/commit/8c82515ab62b88fb32d01c9778f0204b296f3568
https://sumofpwn.nl/advisory/2016/path_traversal_vulnerability_in_wordpress_core_ajax_handlers.html
https://wpvulndb.com/vulnerabilities/8606
https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/40288/

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Related vulnerabilities

Same products first, then exploited flaws of the same weakness class.

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Source: NIST National Vulnerability Database (record CVE-2016-6897), CISA KEV, FIRST EPSS (scores of 2026-09-26). This page is refreshed as NVD updates the record.