Attack ChainAIDerived
Hypothetical attack flow derived from CVE metadata – not a confirmed exploit chain
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AccessIdentify target site running AI Engine with guest upload enabled
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DeliveryIntercept or steal victim guest session cookie
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ExploitEnumerate or infer victim's uploaded file reference
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ExecutionSend crafted DELETE request with stolen session cookie
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ImpactPlugin skips ownership check and deletes victim's file
Vulnerability Assessment
| Weakness |
CWE
OWASP Top 10:2025
A01:2025 - Broken Access Control
ASVS 5.0
V8 - Authorization Object-level authorization, IDOR prevention
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| Exploitation Conditions | Exploitation requires two concrete prerequisites: (1) the attacker must obtain a valid guest session cookie for a victim who has an active chatbot session with the AI Engine plugin - this is the primary barrier and what drives AC:H; and (2) the attacker must know or enumerate the target victim's uploaded file reference. The guest file upload feature of the AI Engine chatbot must be in use (i.e., the site must allow guests to upload files to the chatbot). No WordPress account or authentication is required by the attacker (PR:N confirmed by CVSS vector). Exploitation is limited to deleting files belonging to other guest users - it does not enable reading those files, elevating privileges, or affecting authenticated WordPress user content. Sites enforcing HTTPS with properly scoped session cookies significantly reduce the practicality of session interception. |
| Impact | The NVD CVSS 3.1 score of 4.8 (Medium) with vector AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:L accurately reflects the constrained real-world risk. AC:H is appropriate because successful exploitation requires two preconditions: obtaining a victim guest's session cookie AND knowing the target file reference - neither of which is trivially available to a passive network attacker. EPSS at 0.14% (3rd percentile) corroborates low observed exploitation probability despite POC availability. There is no KEV listing, meaning CISA has not confirmed active in-the-wild exploitation. The impact is bounded: no confidentiality loss, no privilege escalation, and damage is limited to deletion of a specific guest's uploaded files (I:L, A:L). This is not a high-priority emergency patch absent a targeted attack scenario, but the publicly available POC raises the risk for sites where session interception is feasible (e.g., sites without HTTPS or susceptible to XSS). The combination of low EPSS and POC-but-no-KEV is consistent with a targeted rather than mass-exploitation pattern. |
| Exploit ScenarioDerived | An attacker intercepts or otherwise obtains a guest user's session cookie from a WordPress site running AI Engine (e.g., via a network-level sniff on an HTTP-only site or through XSS on a co-hosted plugin). Armed with the session value and knowledge of the victim's uploaded file identifier, the attacker crafts a deletion request containing the stolen cookie, which the plugin accepts and executes without verifying that the session owner matches the file owner. A publicly available proof-of-concept documented by WPScan demonstrates this flow. |
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Alert meAnalysisAIv1 – Aug 11, 2026
Unauthorized file deletion in AI Engine WordPress plugin (before 3.6.4) allows a network attacker who has obtained a guest user's session cookie and file reference to delete that guest's uploaded chatbot files without any server-side ownership check. The plugin authorizes deletion actions solely on a client-supplied session value, making it vulnerable to CWE-639 (Authorization Bypass Through User-Controlled Key). A publicly available proof-of-concept exists per WPScan, though EPSS at 0.14% (3rd percentile) indicates exploitation has not yet been observed at scale.
RemediationAI
Update the AI Engine WordPress plugin to version 3.6.4 or later, which introduces server-side ownership verification for file deletion actions. The vendor advisory and patch details are referenced at https://wpscan.com/vulnerability/8f5460a7-9764-4ce1-9cb4-8202b192765d/ and the NVD entry at https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-16953. If immediate patching is not feasible, the most effective compensating control is to disable the guest file upload feature in the AI Engine plugin settings - this eliminates the attack surface entirely, though it will remove that chatbot capability for guests. Implementing session hardening (short-lived sessions, HTTPS enforcement, SameSite cookie flags) raises the bar for session interception but does not eliminate the underlying authorization flaw.
Affected VersionsENISA
Affected Packages
Source: OSV (Open Source Vulnerabilities)
Affects your stack
Affects 1 package in euvd
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Technical ContextAI · show details
AI Engine is a WordPress plugin (CPE: cpe:2.3:a:unknown:ai_engine:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*) that enables chatbot functionality, including allowing guest users to upload files during chat sessions. The root cause is CWE-639: Authorization Bypass Through User-Controlled Key - the server resolves authorization by trusting an attacker-controllable value (the session cookie) without verifying that the authenticated session identity actually owns the file targeted for deletion. This is a classic IDOR (Insecure Direct Object Reference) pattern: the file reference and session token together act as a capability token, but neither the file reference nor the session is tied to an ownership record validated server-side. Versions prior to 3.6.4 are confirmed affected.
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Severity by source
AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:L
Network-reachable but AC:H because attacker must separately obtain session cookie and file reference; no confidentiality impact since files are deleted, not read.
Primary rating from Vendor (WPScan).
CVSS VectorVendor: WPScan
Lifecycle Timeline
4DescriptionCVE.org
The AI Engine WordPress plugin before 3.6.4 does not verify ownership of a guest's uploaded chatbot files before deletion, authorising the action solely by a client-supplied session cookie value, so an unauthenticated attacker who obtains a victim's session identifier and file reference can delete that victim's uploaded files.
Threat Intelligence Overview
How this decision was reached
The engine reads each signal below and applies a fixed list of rules from top to bottom. The first rule that matches sets the recommended action – like a statement, every line is shown.
What every action level means
SSVC AssessmentENISA
Priority Score
Attack Technique
Authentication bypass attacks exploit flaws in the verification mechanisms that control access to systems and applications.
Unrestricted file upload in Jordy Meow's AI Engine: ChatGPT Chatbot plugin for WordPress (versions up to and including 1
Arbitrary file write in the AI Engine WordPress plugin before 3.5.5 lets authenticated editor-level users abuse an unsan
Path traversal in the AI Engine WordPress plugin (versions 3.3.3 through 3.7.1) allows arbitrary server file reads with
Privilege escalation in the AI Engine WordPress plugin (versions 2.8.0 through 3.6.0) enables any sub-site Administrator
The AI Engine WordPress plugin before 2.6.5 does not sanitize and escape a parameter from one of its RESP API endpoint b
AI Engine < 2.4.3 is susceptible to remote-code-execution (RCE) via Log Poisoning. Rated high severity (CVSS 7.2), this
Server-Side Request Forgery (SSRF) vulnerability in Jordy Meow AI Engine: ChatGPT Chatbot.1.4. Rated medium severity (CV
Cleartext exposure of third-party API keys and authentication tokens in AI Engine WordPress plugin (before 3.6.4) allows
Unauthorized access to private chatbot conversations in the AI Engine WordPress plugin before 3.5.5 allows any authentic
Unauthenticated remote attackers can invoke AI queries against a site owner's configured provider account through the AI
Unrestricted Upload of File with Dangerous Type vulnerability in Jordy Meow AI Engine: ChatGPT Chatbot.2.63. Rated criti
Unrestricted Upload of File with Dangerous Type vulnerability in Jordy Meow AI Engine: ChatGPT Chatbot.1.4. Rated critic
EUVD-2026-54744
GHSA-rv7j-gq5m-787c
NVD
CVE.org
EPSS
Exploit-DB