CVE-2025-13542

Critical

Published: 02 December 2025

Published

02 December 2025

Modified

15 April 2026

KEV Added

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Patch

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CVSS Score 9.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

EPSS Score 0.0018 39.7th percentile

Risk Priority 20 60% EPSS · 20% KEV · 20% CVSS

Summary

CVE-2025-13542 is a critical-severity Improper Privilege Management (CWE-269) vulnerability in Themeforest (inferred from references). Its CVSS base score is 9.8 (Critical).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190); ranked at the 39.7th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.

The strongest mitigations our analysis identified are NIST 800-53 AC-2 (Account Management) and AC-6 (Least Privilege).

Threat & Defense at a Glance

What attackers do: exploitation maps to Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190) and 1 other technique. What defenders deploy: see the NIST 800-53 controls recommended below.

Threat & Defense Details

Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5)AI

AC-6 Least Privilege good match

prevent

Enforces least privilege by restricting user registration to minimal roles, directly preventing self-assignment of administrator privileges.

SI-10 Information Input Validation good match

prevent

Requires validation of user-supplied role parameters in the registration function to block unauthorized privilege escalations.

AC-2 Account Management good match

prevent

Mandates secure account management processes that prohibit unauthenticated users from assigning themselves elevated roles during registration.

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI

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 →

T1068 Exploitation for Privilege Escalation Privilege Escalation

Adversaries may exploit software vulnerabilities in an attempt to elevate privileges.

attack.mitre.org →

Why these techniques?

Unauthenticated remote exploitation of a public-facing WordPress plugin vulnerability enables initial access (T1190) and privilege escalation to administrator (T1068).

Confidence: HIGH · MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise v19.0

NVD Description

The DesignThemes LMS plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Privilege Escalation in all versions up to, and including, 1.0.4. This is due to the 'dtlms_register_user_front_end' function not restricting what user roles a user can register with. This makes it possible…

for unauthenticated attackers to supply the 'administrator' role during registration and gain administrator access to the site.

Deeper analysisAI

CVE-2025-13542 is a privilege escalation vulnerability in the DesignThemes LMS plugin for WordPress, affecting all versions up to and including 1.0.4. The flaw arises in the 'dtlms_register_user_front_end' function, which does not restrict the user roles that can be specified during registration. This allows attackers to assign themselves elevated privileges, such as administrator, upon creating an account. The vulnerability is rated critical with a CVSS v3.1 base score of 9.8 (AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H) and is associated with CWE-269 (Improper Privilege Management). It was published on 2025-12-02.

Unauthenticated attackers can exploit this vulnerability remotely with low complexity and no user interaction required. By submitting a registration request with the 'administrator' role parameter, they gain immediate administrator access to the WordPress site. This enables full control, including arbitrary code execution, data exfiltration, site modification, or further lateral movement within the environment.

Mitigation details are outlined in advisories such as the Wordfence threat intelligence report at https://www.wordfence.com/threat-intel/vulnerabilities/id/c880470f-3f81-47a2-b450-7074410e9f43?source=cve. Additional context on the plugin is available via its ThemeForest page at https://themeforest.net/item/egrad-education-wordpress-theme/42803015. Security practitioners should verify patch availability and update the plugin if a fixed version exists beyond 1.0.4.