Executive brief
WP Recipe Maker is a WordPress plugin that allows users to create, manage, and publish recipes on their website. Authenticated attackers with contributor-level access or higher can gain control of recipes created by administrators by changing the recipe's ownership and unpublishing it, potentially disrupting content management and site operations. This vulnerability requires specific plugin settings to transfer ownership but unpublishing is possible regardless of configuration.
Technical details
The WP Recipe Maker plugin fails to properly verify user authorization when handling recipe updates, specifically when modifying the post_author and post_status fields. An authenticated attacker with contributor-level access or above can exploit this vulnerability via direct API calls or form submissions to overwrite the post_author field with their own user ID (if the 'recipe_use_author' setting is 'parent') and change the post_status to draft or pending. The vulnerability is accessible to any authenticated user at the contributor level or above and requires no additional user interaction. An attacker can achieve unauthorized ownership transfer and unpublishing of administrator-created recipes, disrupting content and potentially enabling further malicious actions. Patches are available in versions after 10.8.0.
Affected products
- WP Recipe Maker WP Recipe Maker up to and including 10.8.0
Timeline
- 2026-09-09: disclosed