CVE-2025-14153: 
WordPress vulnerability analysis and mitigation

CVE-2025-14153 is a time-based SQL injection vulnerability in the "Page Expire Popup/Redirection for WordPress" plugin for WordPress. It affects all versions up to and including 1.0, and was disclosed on January 5–6, 2026, with Wordfence as the reporting CNA. The vulnerability carries a CVSS v3.1 base score of 6.5 (Medium), assigned by Wordfence (Wordfence).

The root cause is improper neutralization of special elements in an SQL command (CWE-89), specifically insufficient escaping of the user-supplied id shortcode attribute and lack of prepared statements in the plugin's SQL query logic, located in inc/vfpageexpirepopupstructure.php at line 8. An authenticated attacker with Author-level access or above can append malicious SQL payloads to the existing query via the id attribute of the plugin's shortcode, triggering time-based blind SQL injection. No user interaction is required beyond the attacker having a valid WordPress account with at least Author privileges (Wordfence, WordPress Trac).

Successful exploitation allows an authenticated attacker to extract sensitive information from the WordPress database, potentially including user credentials (hashed passwords), email addresses, secret keys, and other configuration data. The impact is limited to confidentiality — integrity and availability are not directly affected by this vulnerability. Extracted credentials or sensitive data could facilitate further account takeover or lateral movement within the WordPress environment (Wordfence).

No public exploit code or active in-the-wild exploitation has been reported for CVE-2025-14153 as of the available data. The EPSS score is approximately 0.026% (0.000260), indicating a low probability of exploitation in the near term. The vulnerability is not listed in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog. Exploitation requires at minimum Author-level authentication, which limits the attack surface compared to unauthenticated vulnerabilities (Wordfence).

1. Reconnaissance: Identify WordPress sites running the "Page Expire Popup/Redirection for WordPress" plugin version 1.0 or earlier, using tools like WPScan or by inspecting plugin directories.
2. Obtain Author-level access: Register or compromise a WordPress account with at least Author privileges on the target site.
3. Craft malicious shortcode: Insert a shortcode with a manipulated id attribute containing a time-based SQL injection payload, e.g., [page_expire_popup id="1 AND SLEEP(5)--"] into a post or page.
4. Observe time delay: Publish or preview the post/page and measure the server response time; a delay confirms the injection is executing in the database context.
5. Extract data: Use automated tools such as sqlmap with the identified injection point to enumerate database tables, extract user credentials, secret keys, or other sensitive data from the WordPress database (Wordfence, WordPress Trac).

• Logs: WordPress or web server access logs showing unusual or repeated requests to pages/posts containing the page_expire_popup shortcode with anomalous id parameter values (e.g., SQL keywords like SLEEP, BENCHMARK, AND, OR, or encoded equivalents).
• Database: Unexpected or slow-running queries in MySQL slow query logs originating from the WordPress database user, particularly involving SLEEP() or BENCHMARK() functions.
• Application: Posts or pages authored by lower-privileged accounts (Author role) containing shortcodes with numeric id values appended with SQL syntax fragments.

Users should update the "Page Expire Popup/Redirection for WordPress" plugin to a version beyond 1.0, as the patch was committed to the plugin repository (changeset 3427583). The fix introduces proper escaping and prepared statements for the id shortcode attribute. As a temporary workaround, site administrators can restrict Author-level user accounts or disable the plugin until a patched version is applied (Wordfence, WordPress Trac Changeset).

Wordfence included this vulnerability in their weekly WordPress vulnerability report for January 5–11, 2026, as part of routine plugin security monitoring (Wordfence Blog). No significant broader media coverage or notable researcher commentary beyond standard vulnerability aggregation has been identified for this CVE.