Simple History – Track, Log, and Audit WordPress Changes <= 5.26.0 - Authenticated (Subscriber+) Account Takeover via Missing Authorization on Event Reaction Endpoint

Summary

The Simple History – Track, Log, and Audit WordPress Changes plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to authenticated (Subscriber+) account takeover in all versions up to, and including, 5.26.0 via the event reaction endpoints (react_to_event() / unreact_to_event()). The endpoints register get_items_permissions_check() as their permission_callback, which only verifies the requester is logged in and does not enforce the per-logger capability checks normally applied by Log_Query. As a result, a Subscriber-level user can POST to /wp-json/simple-history/v1/events/<id>/react with the _fields=context query parameter and read the full context of any Simple History event — including SimpleUserLogger entries that record the full password-reset email body (reset URL with the reset key) for any user. The attacker triggers a password reset for an administrator via the lost-password form, brute-forces recent event IDs through the reaction endpoint to read the resulting user_requested_password_reset_link event, extracts the reset key from context.message, and completes the password reset to take over the administrator account. Exploitation requires an administrator to have first enabled the experimental features option (simple_history_experimental_features_enabled), which is not the default.

Timeline

1. May 30, 2026, 9:29 AM UTCCVE published
2. Jun 1, 2026, 10:32 AM UTCCISA SSVC assessment

   Exploitation: none · Automatable: no · Technical impact: total

3. Jun 1, 2026, 10:33 AM UTCRecord last updated

Affected versions

• eskapism Simple History – Track, Log, and Audit WordPress Changes

  through 5.26.0

References 13