Security Resilience

CVE-2025-12496

Path Traversal

Path Traversal
Published
17 December 2025
Modified
28 September 2026
CVSS Score v3.1 4.9
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N
EPSS Score 0.0069 52th percentile
Risk Priority 40 floored blend · peak EPSS

CVSS and EPSS are reproduced from their sources (NVD, FIRST EPSS). Risk Priority is our own derived reading, not an NVD score.

Summary

CVE-2025-12496 is a medium-severity Path Traversal (CWE-22) vulnerability in Wordpress (inferred from references). Its CVSS base score is 4.9 (Medium).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190); ranked in the top 48% of CVEs by exploit likelihood; it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.

The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to AC-3 (Access Enforcement) and SI-10 (Information Input Validation) — see the control section below for these in your framework.

OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)

A01:2025 Broken Access Control

EU & UK References

Vulnerability Data

The Zephyr Project Manager plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Directory Traversal in all versions up to, and including, 3.3.203 via the `file` parameter. This makes it possible for authenticated attackers, with Custom-level access and above, to read the contents…

more

of arbitrary files on the server, which can contain sensitive information. On a servers that have `allow_url_fopen` enabled, this issue allows for Server-Side Request Forgery

CWE(s)
CWE-22

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques

T1190 Exploit Public-Facing Application Initial Access
Adversaries may attempt to exploit a weakness in an Internet-facing host or system to initially access a network.
attack.mitre.org →
Derived from this CVE’s CWE(s) via the direct CWE→ATT&CK cross-walk.

CVEs Like This One

CVE-2025-14997Shared CWE-22
CVE-2025-1543Shared CWE-22
CVE-2025-2328Shared CWE-22
CVE-2024-9362Shared CWE-22
CVE-2025-41757Shared CWE-22
CVE-2023-40274Shared CWE-22
CVE-2026-1776Shared CWE-22
CVE-2024-37169Shared CWE-22
CVE-2023-25508Shared CWE-22
CVE-2025-8343Shared CWE-22

Affected Assets

Wordpress
—
inferred from references and description; NVD did not file a CPE for this CVE

Mitigating Controls

Control response

Prevent
Stop it (NIST 800-53)

—

Detect
Catch it (NIST detect / respond)

—

Harden
Shrink the surface (DISA STIG)

—

Validate
Prove the fix (OWASP ASVS)
  • V5.3.2

Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI

AC-3 Access Enforcement good match

Enforces the intended directory access authorizations that path traversal would otherwise bypass.

SI-10 Information Input Validation good match

Input validation directly neutralizes special path elements before pathname construction occurs.

AC-6 Least Privilege partial match

Least privilege reduces the impact of any unauthorized file access obtained via traversal.

Mitigating Controls (NIST CSF 2.0) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→CSF cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

PR.PS-02 partial match
blocks

Patching/maintenance can remediate known path-traversal flaws in deployed software (partial prevention of exploitability) but does nothing to stop the coding defect from being introduced in the first place.

Mitigating Controls (ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Annex A) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→ISO cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

A.8.29 Security testing in development and acceptance mostly match
finds

Security testing in development catches path traversal via static/dynamic analysis.

A.8.28 Secure coding partial match
prevents

Secure coding standards explicitly forbid unsafe path construction and mandate safe APIs.

References