Independent security researcher Dawid Golunski has released Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability a proof-of-concept exploit code for an unauthenticated remote code execution vulnerability in WordPress 4.6 ( CVE-2016-10033 ) , and information about an unauthorized password reset zero-day vulnerability ( CVE-2017-8295 ) in the latest version of the popular CMS . The vulnerability exists in Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability the PHPMailer library , and can be exploited Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability by unauthenticated remote attackers to gain access to and compromise an target application server on which a vulnerable WordPress Core version is installed ( in its default configuration ) . “ No plugins or non-standard settings are required to exploit the vulnerability , ” Golunski noted . The hole has been responsibly disclosed Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability to the WordPress Foundation , and has been plugged Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability in January , with the release of WordPress 4.7.1 . Still , according to the Foundation ’ s own numbers , nearly 11 percent of all WordPress installation out there are still stuck on the vulnerable version 4.6 . And , as Golunski noted Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability , it ’ s possible that older WordPress versions are also affected Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability by the same flaw , so the percentage of vulnerable installations could be considerably higher : Admins who still run these older versions of the popular CMS should upgrade Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability to newer versions , ideally to the latest one ( v4.7.4 ) . Still , even that might not be a guarantee against compromise , as Golunski has also publicly released Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability information and POC code for an unauthorized password reset vulnerability ( CVE-2017-8295 ) that the WordPress Foundation is yet to patch Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability . According to him and BeyondSecurity , whose SecuriTeam coordinated the disclosure Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability of the flaw to the WordPress developers , the discovery Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability of the vulnerability dates back to mid-2016 . Golunski found Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability it in version 4.3.1 of the CMS . “ WordPress has a password reset feature that contains Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability a vulnerability which might in some cases allow attackers to get hold of the password reset link without previous authentication . Such attack could lead to an attacker gaining unauthorized access to a victim ’ s WordPress account , ” BeyondSecurity explained . “ The vulnerability stems from WordPress using untrusted data by default when creating a password reset e-mail that is supposed to be delivered only to the e-mail associated with the owner ’ s account. ” Golunski says Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability that the issue was reported Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability to the WordPress security team multiple times , but they did not confirm whether it has been patched Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability . He ultimately decided to publish Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability his findings , and offer Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability a temporary solution ( “ users can enable UseCanonicalName to enforce static SERVER_NAME value ” ) .