Executive brief
The Etude theme for WordPress is vulnerable to a security flaw that allows unauthorized individuals to access sensitive files on the web server. By exploiting this vulnerability, an attacker could view internal configuration files, such as those containing database passwords, potentially leading to a full takeover of the website and its data. This issue affects all versions of the theme up to and including 1.6, and there is currently no official fix available from the developer.
Technical details
A Local File Inclusion (LFI) vulnerability exists in the ThemeREX Etude theme for WordPress (versions <= 1.6) due to improper control of filenames in PHP include/require statements (CWE-98). An unauthenticated remote attacker can exploit this by sending specially crafted requests to include local files from the server's filesystem. Successful exploitation can lead to the disclosure of sensitive information, such as wp-config.php, which contains database credentials. While the attack vector is network-based and requires no privileges, the CVSS assessment indicates high complexity, likely due to specific environmental requirements or input sanitization that must be bypassed. As of the advisory date, no official patch has been released.
Affected products
- ThemeREX Etude <= 1.6
Timeline
- 2025-11-09: other: Vulnerability reported by researcher Bonds
- 2026-05-27: disclosed: Vulnerability details published by Patchstack
- 2026-06-17: advisory: CVE published in NVD