Analyzing Attack Data and Trends Targeting Ukrainian Domains

As we continue to monitor the cyber situation in Ukraine, the data we are seeing shows some interesting trends. Not only has the volume of attacks continued rising throughout the war in Ukraine, the types of attacks have been varied. A common tactic of cyber criminals is to run automated exploit...

Wordfence Launches Wordfence Intelligence for Hosts and Network Defenders

This morning the Wordfence team is launching Wordfence Intelligence live at Black Hat 2022 in Las Vegas. Our entire team is here in Las Vegas, including our international team members. Id like to tell you more about what were launching and how Wordfence Intelligence will help us go even further t...

Ukrainian Website Threat Landscape Throughout 2022

The Russian invasion of Ukraine began on February 20, 2022. By mid-March it was clear the cyber-war had begun, and the attacks have been consistent ever since. Prior to this, on March 1, 2022, Wordfence reported on an attack campaign on Ukrainian university websites. In response, we deployed our...

Wordfence Intelligence Launching at Black Hat 2022 in Las Vegas Next Week

Wordfence protects over 4 million websites around the world on 12,000 unique networks, and we block over 1.8 billion attacks targeting those websites every month. For years we have had a relationship with our customers that is a virtuous cycle: We receive attack reports from our customers at a ra...

Cross-Site Request Forgery Vulnerability Patched in Ecwid Ecommerce Shopping Cart Plugin

On June 24, 2022, the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for a Cross-Site Request Forgery vulnerability we discovered in Ecwid Ecommerce Shopping Cart, a WordPress plugin installed on over 30,000 sites. This vulnerability made it possible for attackers...

High Severity Vulnerability Patched in Download Manager Plugin

On July 8, 2022 the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for a vulnerability we discovered in “Download Manager,” a WordPress plugin that is installed on over 100,000 sites. This flaw makes it possible for an authenticated attacker to delete arbitrary...

Analyzing Attack Data and Trends Targeting Log4J

The Log4j vulnerability, initially reported in November 2021, has affected millions of devices and applications around the world. It has the potential to allow a malicious actor to take full control of vulnerable devices. As a result of how Log4j controls the logging of strings and code, the...

PSA: Sudden Increase In Attacks On Modern WPBakery Page Builder Addons Vulnerability

The Wordfence Threat Intelligence team has been monitoring a sudden increase in attack attempts targeting Kaswara Modern WPBakery Page Builder Addons. This ongoing campaign is attempting to take advantage of an arbitrary file upload vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2021-24284, which has been...

Securing Port 443: The Gateway To A New Universe

At Wordfence our business is to secure over 4 million WordPress websites and keep them secure. My background is in network operations, and then I transitioned into software development because my ops role was at a scale where I found myself writing a lot of code. This led me to founding startups,...

PSA: Critical Vulnerability Patched in Ninja Forms WordPress Plugin

On June 16, 2022, the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team noticed a back-ported security update in Ninja Forms, a WordPress plugin with over one million active installations. As with all security updates in WordPress plugins and themes, our team analyzed the plugin to determine the exploitability...

Top Five Attacking IPs This Month: Their Locations May Not Be Where You Think

At Wordfence, we see large amounts of threat actor data, and often that data tells unexpected stories. Taking a look at just the top five attacking IP addresses over a 30 day period, you might be surprised to find out where these attacks are originating, and what they are doing. When most people...

Cross-Site Scripting Vulnerability In Download Manager Plugin

On May 30, 2022, Security Researcher Rafie Muhammad reported a reflected Cross-Site Scripting XSS vulnerability to us that they discovered in Download Manager, a WordPress plugin installed on over 100,000 sites. On request, we assigned a vulnerability identifier of CVE-2022-1985. All Wordfence...

The Cybersecurity CIA Triad: What You Need to Know as a WordPress Site Owner

One of the core concepts of cybersecurity is known as the CIA Triad. There are three pillars to the triad, with each pillar being designed to address an aspect of securing data. These three pillars are Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability. The Confidentiality pillar is intended to prevent...

Critical Privilege Escalation Vulnerability in Jupiter and JupiterX Premium Themes

On April 5, 2022, the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for a set of vulnerabilities in the Jupiter and JupiterX Premium themes and the required JupiterX Core companion plugin for WordPress, which included a critical privilege escalation vulnerability...

Millions of Attacks Target Tatsu Builder Plugin

The Wordfence Threat Intelligence team has been tracking a large-scale attack against a Remote Code Execution vulnerability in Tatsu Builder, which is tracked by CVE-2021-25094 and was publicly disclosed on March 24, 2022 by an independent security researcher. The issue is present in vulnerable...

PHP Object Injection Vulnerability in Booking Calendar Plugin

On April 18, 2022, the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for an Object Injection vulnerability in the Booking Calendar plugin for WordPress, which has over 60,000 installations. We received a response the same day and sent over our full disclosure ear...

Critical Remote Code Execution Vulnerability in Elementor

On March 29, 2022, the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the disclosure process for a critical vulnerability in the Elementor plugin that allowed any authenticated user to upload arbitrary PHP code. Elementor is one of the most popular WordPress plugins and is installed on over 5 milli...

Critical Authentication Bypass Vulnerability Patched in SiteGround Security Plugin

On March 10, 2022 the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for a vulnerability we discovered in “SiteGround Security”, a WordPress plugin that is installed on over 400,000 sites. This flaw makes it possible for attackers to gain administrative user acces...

Reflected XSS in Spam protection, AntiSpam, FireWall by CleanTalk

Update - after this article was published, Denis Shagimuratov of CleanTalk reached out to us on Twitter. It appears that they didnt receive our disclosure because our contact at the company was no longer the correct recipient for this type of issue. On February 15, 2022, the Wordfence Threat...

Increase In Malware Sightings on GoDaddy Managed Hosting

Today, March 15, 2022, The Wordfence Incident Response team alerted our Threat Intelligence team to an increase in infected websites hosted on GoDaddy’s Managed WordPress service, which includes MediaTemple, tsoHost, 123Reg, Domain Factory, Heart Internet, and Host Europe Managed WordPress sites...

WordPress 5.9.2 Security Update Fixes XSS and Prototype Pollution Vulnerabilities

Last night, just after 6pm Pacific time, on Thursday March 10, 2022, the WordPress core team released WordPress version 5.9.2, which contains security patches for a high-severity vulnerability as well as two medium-severity issues. The high-severity issue affects version 5.9.0 and 5.9.1 and allow...

We’re Now Blocking 10,000 Requests Per Hour in Ukraine From Known Malicious IPs

48 hours ago we deployed our commercial real-time threat intelligence automatically, and for free, to all Ukrainian websites with the .UA top-level domain. That has made over 8,000 sites in Ukraine using the free version of Wordfence significantly more secure. At noon-UTC on March 2nd, those site...

Ukraine Universities Hacked As Russian Invasion Started

Note: This article has been updated to reflect that the hosting provider "Njalla", which routed the malicious traffic involved in this attack, is based in Sweden, not in Finland, although IP geolocation data indicates that the specific server that the traffic transited may be based in Finland. We...

Stored Cross-Site Scripting Vulnerability Patched in a WordPress Photo Gallery Plugin

On November 11, 2021 the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for a vulnerability we discovered in “Photoswipe Masonry Gallery”, a WordPress plugin that is installed on over 10,000 sites. This flaw makes it possible for an authenticated attacker to injec...

Entering a Higher State of Vigilance – Ukraine Under Attack

It appears that Russia has just commenced the invasion of Ukraine. Check your preferred international news outlet, but according to the Ukrainian foreign minister "Putin has just launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine." Ukrainian airspace is closed with flights diverting. The Twitter Safety...

Reflected XSS in Header Footer Code Manager

On February 15, 2022, the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team responsibly disclosed a reflected Cross-Site Scripting XSS vulnerability in Header Footer Code Manager, a WordPress plugin with over 300,000 installations. The plugin publisher quickly acknowledged our initial contact and we sent the fu...

Friday Fun: From Idea to Animated Film

Its Friday, and I thought wed have fun talking about something a little different. At Wordfence, one of my priorities is fostering a strong creative team and culture, and investing in creators. Emily Dalmas joined us as a full-time producer almost a year ago via her job as Associate Producer for...

Vulnerability in UpdraftPlus Allowed Subscribers to Download Sensitive Backups

Update: a previous version of this article indicated that an attacker would need to begin their attack when a backup was in progress, and would need to guess the appropriate timestamp to download a backup. Since the article was originally published, we have found that it is possible to obtain a...

Reflected Cross-Site Scripting Vulnerability Patched in WordPress Profile Builder Plugin

On January 4, 2022 the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for a vulnerability we discovered in “Profile Builder – User Profile & User Registration Forms”, a WordPress plugin that is installed on over 50,000 WordPress websites. This vulnerability makes ...

Unauthenticated SQL Injection Vulnerability Patched in WordPress Statistics Plugin

On February 7, 2022, Security Researcher Cyku Hong from DEVCORE reported a vulnerability to us that they discovered in WP Statistics, a WordPress plugin installed on over 600,000 sites. This vulnerability made it possible for unauthenticated attackers to execute arbitrary SQL queries by appending...

Critical Vulnerabilities in PHP Everywhere Allow Remote Code Execution

On January 4, 2022, the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team began the responsible disclosure process for several Remote Code Execution vulnerabilities in PHP Everywhere, a WordPress plugin installed on over 30,000 websites. One of these vulnerabilities allowed any authenticated user of any level,...

Announcing Wordfence Care and Wordfence Response

Today Im incredibly excited to announce that we are launching two new products: Wordfence Care and Wordfence Response. Lets start with a fun animation that explains our new product suite! In the post below, Ill describe in detail the two incredible new products we are launching and why they are...

Unauthenticated XSS Vulnerability Patched in HTML Email Template Designer Plugin

On December 23, 2021 the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for a vulnerability we discovered in “WordPress Email Template Designer – WP HTML Mail”, a WordPress plugin that is installed on over 20,000 sites. This flaw made it possible for an...

84,000 WordPress Sites Affected by Three Plugins With The Same Vulnerability

On November 5, 2021 the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for a vulnerability we discovered in “Login/Signup Popup”, a WordPress plugin that is installed on over 20,000 sites. A few days later we discovered the same vulnerability present in two...

WordPress 5.8.3 Security Release

On January 6, 2022, the WordPress core team released WordPress version 5.8.3, which contains security patches for 4 high-severity vulnerabilities. These patches were backported to every version of WordPress since 3.7. WordPress has supported automatic core updates for security releases since...

1.6 Million WordPress Sites Hit With 13.7 Million Attacks In 36 Hours From 16,000 IPs

Today, on December 9, 2021, our Threat Intelligence team noticed a drastic uptick in attacks targeting vulnerabilities that make it possible for attackers to update arbitrary options on vulnerable sites. This led us into an investigation which uncovered an active attack targeting over a million...

Authentication Bypass Vulnerability Patched in User Registration Plugin

Note: To receive disclosures like this in your inbox the moment they’re published, you can subscribe to our WordPress Security Mailing List. On September 16, 2021 the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for a vulnerability we discovered in...

XSS Vulnerability Patched in Plugin Designed to Enhance WooCommerce

Note: To receive disclosures like this in your inbox the moment they’re published, you can subscribe to our WordPress Security Mailing List. On November 11, 2021 the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for a vulnerability we discovered in “Variation...

AWS Attacks Targeting WordPress Increase 5X

The Wordfence Threat Intelligence team has been tracking a huge increase in malicious login attempts against WordPress sites in our network. Since November 17, 2021, the number of attacks targeting login pages has doubled. We’ve seen a global increase in attacks against WordPress sites during the...

GoDaddy Breach Widens to tsoHost, Media Temple, 123Reg, Domain Factory, Heart Internet, and Host Europe

Yesterday GoDaddy disclosed a massive data breach impacting over 1.2 Million customers. Today, we received confirmation from GoDaddy that multiple brands that resell GoDaddy Managed WordPress were impacted. The brands impacted include: tsoHost Media Temple 123Reg Domain Factory Heart Internet Hos...

GoDaddy Breached – Plaintext Passwords – 1.2M Affected

There is an update available here: GoDaddy Breach Widens to tsoHost, Media Temple, 123Reg, Domain Factory, Heart Internet, and Host Europe This morning, GoDaddy disclosed that an unknown attacker had gained unauthorized access to the system used to provision the company’s Managed WordPress sites,...

WooCommerce Extension – Reflected XSS Vulnerability

Note: To receive disclosures like this in your inbox the moment they’re published, you can subscribe to our WordPress Security Mailing List. On November 1, 2021 the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for a vulnerability we discovered in “Preview E-mail...

Over 1 Million Sites Impacted by Vulnerability in Starter Templates Plugin

On October 4, 2021, the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for the Starter Templates plugin, which is installed on over 1 Million WordPress websites. The full name of the WordPress plugin is “Starter Templates — Elementor, Gutenberg & Beaver Builder...

Vulnerability in WP DSGVO Tools (GDPR) Plugin Allows Unauthenticated Page Deletion

Note: To receive disclosures like this in your inbox the moment they’re published, you can subscribe to our WordPress Security Mailing List. On September 27, 2021, the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the disclosure process for a vulnerability we found in WP DSGVO Tools GDPR, a...

XSS Vulnerability in NextScripts: Social Networks Auto-Poster Plugin Impacts 100,000 Sites

Note: To receive disclosures like this in your inbox the moment they’re published, you can subscribe to our WordPress Security Mailing List. On August 19, 2021, the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team began the disclosure process for a reflected Cross-Site ScriptingXSS vulnerability we found in...

PSA: Widespread Remote Working Scam Underway

Ive just gotten off the phone with a victim of the scam that Im about to describe. This is impacting a lot of folks, so please do spread the word. Its infuriating. Ill be around to reply to your comments below, but please do not engage in victim-blaming, because until youve actually been hit by o...

1,000,000 Sites Affected by OptinMonster Vulnerabilities

Note: To receive disclosures like this in your inbox the moment they’re published, you can subscribe to our WordPress Security Mailing List. On September 28, 2021 the Wordfence Threat Intelligence team initiated the responsible disclosure process for several vulnerabilities we discovered in...

Site Deletion Vulnerability in Hashthemes Plugin

Update: a previous version of this article incorrectly indicated that this vulnerability could be used for site takeover, we have updated this for accuracy, as the impact is instead complete loss of site content. Note: To receive disclosures like this in your inbox the moment they’re published, y...

Vulnerability Patched in Sassy Social Share Plugin

Update: This article has been updated for accuracy: while we initially did create a rule to block this vulnerability we later found that the vulnerability was already blocked by an existing rule. Note: To receive disclosures like this in your inbox the moment they’re published, you can subscribe ...

It’s Not You. It’s Them. On Hacking and Responsible Disclosure.

A story was recently posted to Hacker News celebrating a hack of IoT devices at a school that let a student and their friends rickroll the school via a video system. On the one hand, this guy is my personal hero and I want to be them. But Im a cybersecurity professional, I run a team that has the...