Vulnerability in PublishPress Capabilities – User Role Editor, Access Permissions, User Capabilities, Admin Menus — CVE-2026-75927
What to do now
Update PublishPress Capabilities – User Role Editor, Access Permissions, User Capabilities, Admin Menus to 2.50.1 or later.
Affected versions
- Everything up to and including 2.50.0
Affected: PublishPress Capabilities – User Role Editor, Access Permissions, User Capabilities, Admin Menus (plugin, capability-manager-enhanced)
What the vulnerability is
The PublishPress Capabilities – User Role Editor, Access Permissions, User Capabilities, Admin Menus plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Privilege Escalation in all versions up to, and including, 2.50.0. This is due to the `addPluginCapabilities()` function unconditionally granting the Editor role all 15 `manage_capabilities_*` capabilities — including `manage_capabilities`, `manage_capabilities_roles`, `manage_capabilities_settings`, and `manage_capabilities_backup` — via a hard-coded `$eligible_roles = ['administrator', 'editor']` assignment that runs automatically on the first `admin_init` after plugin activation with no administrator opt-in, persisting the grants directly to the database. This makes it possible for authenticated attackers with Editor-level access to elevate their privileges to a site-wide capability manager, enabling them to create, rename, and delete non-system roles, modify capabilities of non-administrator roles, restore role backups, and write arbitrary plugin options whose names begin with `cme_`, `capsman`, `pp_capabilities`, or `presspermit` via `update_option()`. The escalation stops short of full Administrator access, as WordPress's `map_meta_cap` layer still prevents the escalated Editor from granting administrator-only capabilities to other roles; however, all role-management and plugin-settings functionality gated solely on `manage_capabilities_*` capabilities remains fully accessible.
Sources
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/capability-manager-enhanced/tags/2.50.0/classes/pp-capabilities-installer.php#L78
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/capability-manager-enhanced/tags/2.50.0/includes/admin-load.php#L758
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/capability-manager-enhanced/tags/2.50.0/includes/functions-admin.php#L361
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/capability-manager-enhanced/tags/2.50.0/includes/manager.php#L1186
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/capability-manager-enhanced/tags/2.50.0/includes/settings-handler.php#L22
- https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/changeset?reponame=&old=3665572%40capability-manager-enhanced&new=3665572%40capability-manager-enhanced