CVE-2025-23428

High

Published: 14 February 2025

Published

14 February 2025

Modified

23 April 2026

KEV Added

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Patch

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CVSS Score v3.1 7.1 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:L

EPSS Score 0.0011 29.3th percentile

Risk Priority 14 60% EPSS · 20% KEV · 20% CVSS

Summary

CVE-2025-23428 is a high-severity Cross-site Scripting (CWE-79) vulnerability. Its CVSS base score is 7.1 (High).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190); ranked at the 29.3th 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 SI-10 (Information Input Validation) and SI-15 (Information Output Filtering).

Deeper analysis

CVE-2025-23428 is an Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation vulnerability, classified as Reflected Cross-site Scripting (XSS) under CWE-79. It affects the QMean – WordPress Did You Mean plugin by Arash Safari, impacting all versions from n/a through 2.0 inclusive.

The vulnerability can be exploited by remote attackers requiring no privileges (PR:N), over the network (AV:N), with low attack complexity (AC:L), though it demands user interaction (UI:R) such as clicking a malicious link. Successful exploitation changes scope (S:C), enabling low impacts on confidentiality, integrity, and availability (C:L/I:L/A:L), for a CVSS v3.1 base score of 7.1. Attackers can inject and execute arbitrary scripts in the context of a victim's browser viewing the reflected page.

The Patchstack advisory at https://patchstack.com/database/Wordpress/Plugin/qmean/vulnerability/wordpress-qmean-plugin-2-0-reflected-cross-site-scripting-xss-vulnerability?_s_id=cve documents the Reflected XSS issue in QMean plugin version 2.0 and provides mitigation guidance for affected WordPress installations.

EU & UK References

🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2025-3175

Vulnerability details

Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') vulnerability in Arash Safari QMean – WordPress Did You Mean qmean allows Reflected XSS.This issue affects QMean – WordPress Did You Mean: from n/a through <= 2.0.

CWE(s): CWE-79

Related Threats

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 →

T1059.007 JavaScript Execution

Adversaries may abuse various implementations of JavaScript for execution.

attack.mitre.org →

Why these techniques?

Reflected XSS in public-facing WordPress plugin enables exploitation of the web application (T1190) and execution of arbitrary JavaScript in the victim's browser (T1059.007).

Confidence: HIGH · MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise v18.1