CVE-2025-69182
Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:HCVSS and EPSS are reproduced from their sources (NVD, FIRST EPSS). Risk Priority is our own derived reading, not an NVD score.
Summary
CVE-2025-69182 is a high-severity Incorrect Privilege Assignment (CWE-266) vulnerability. Its CVSS base score is 8.8 (High).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Temporary Elevated Cloud Access (T1548.005); ranked at the 38th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to AC-6 (Least Privilege) and AC-2 (Account Management) — see the control section below for these in your framework.
Deeper analysis AI-assisted summary
Synthesised by an AI model from the NVD description and linked references — a reading aid, not an authoritative source.
CVE-2025-69182 is an Incorrect Privilege Assignment vulnerability (CWE-266) in the Institutions Directory WordPress plugin developed by e-plugins. The flaw enables privilege escalation and affects the plugin in all versions from n/a through 1.3.4 inclusive. Published on 2026-01-22, it carries a CVSS v3.1 base score of 8.8 (AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H), indicating high severity due to its potential for significant impact.
The vulnerability can be exploited by an attacker who already possesses low privileges (PR:L), such as a subscribed user on a WordPress site running the affected plugin. Exploitation occurs over the network (AV:N) with low complexity (AC:L) and requires no user interaction (UI:N), allowing the attacker to escalate privileges. Successful exploitation grants high impacts on confidentiality, integrity, and availability (C:H/I:H/A:H), potentially enabling full administrative control over the site.
Mitigation details are available in the Patchstack advisory at https://patchstack.com/database/Wordpress/Plugin/institutions-directory/vulnerability/wordpress-institutions-directory-plugin-1-3-4-privilege-escalation-vulnerability?_s_id=cve.
OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2026-3926
Vulnerability Data
Incorrect Privilege Assignment vulnerability in e-plugins Institutions Directory institutions-directory allows Privilege Escalation.This issue affects Institutions Directory: from n/a through <= 1.3.4.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Control response
—
—
- 8 hardening rules · 6 OS baselines
—
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Least privilege directly requires that only the minimal necessary privileges are assigned to each actor.
Account management defines and authorizes the exact privileges granted to each account or role.
Enforces only the authorizations that were assigned, so correct assignment is a prerequisite.
Separation of duties constrains which privilege combinations may be assigned to any actor.
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.
Directly enforces least-privilege policy definition, management, and review that prevents incorrect privilege assignments.
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.5.15 directly requires determining access needs, defining/enforcing topic-specific access control policy and rules (including need-to-know, privilege restrictions, segregation, formal authorization, role-based mapping, and consistency with classification), which stops most incorrect privilege assignments from being exploitable; the bounded remainder is incorrect assignments that arise from flawed implementation of those rules rather than from their absence.
A.5.18's provisioning, review, revocation and SoD rules (esp. a,b,c,f,i,j) directly stop most incorrect privilege assignments from being granted or persisting, with a bounded remainder in flawed implementation of the authorization step itself (see 5.9/5.15 dependency)
A.8.2 directly controls the identification, allocation, review, expiry, and temporary nature of privileged rights per policy, which stops most incorrect assignments from creating an exploitable sphere of control; the bounded remainder is incorrect privilege semantics inside code that the authorization process never sees.
Information-access-restriction mechanisms enforce the correct privilege boundaries once assignment rules are defined.
Hardening callouts derived
Configuration rules from DISA STIG baselines that bear on weaknesses of the type cited by this CVE. Each rule is shown with the relationship its mapping actually records, against the CWE it was authored against. Derived via CVE→CWE over `controls_xwalks` (higher-evidence rows only; rows rated `none` are excluded).
Oracle Linux 8 (1 rule)
- V-248551 A sticky bit must be set on all OL 8 public directories to prevent unauthorized and unintended information transferred via shared system resources. blocks CWE-266
Oracle Linux 9 (1 rule)
- V-271779 OL 9 must be configured so that a sticky bit must be set on all public directories. blocks CWE-266
RHEL 8 (1 rule)
- V-230243 A sticky bit must be set on all RHEL 8 public directories to prevent unauthorized and unintended information transferred via shared system resources. blocks CWE-266
RHEL 9 (1 rule)
- V-257929 A sticky bit must be set on all RHEL 9 public directories. blocks CWE-266
Ubuntu 22.04 (2 rules)
- V-260513 Ubuntu 22.04 LTS must set a sticky bit on all public directories to prevent unauthorized and unintended information transferred via shared system resources. blocks CWE-266
- V-260559 Ubuntu 22.04 LTS must ensure only users who need access to security functions are part of sudo group. blocks CWE-266
Ubuntu 24.04 (2 rules)
- V-270748 Ubuntu 24.04 LTS must ensure only users who need access to security functions are part of sudo group. blocks CWE-266
- V-270750 Ubuntu 24.04 LTS must set a sticky bit on all public directories to prevent unauthorized and unintended information transferred via shared system resources. blocks CWE-266