No WordPress Security Plugins Protected Against Recently Disclosed Vulnerability That Exposes WooCommerce Order Data
Recently we started testing to see what protection WordPress security plugins provide against vulnerabilities in other plugins (since plugins vulnerabilities are an actual source of websites being hacked, unlike some other things that these plugins make a big deal or providing protection against). The first vulnerability we tested could be used for serving up malware on a website and the second could give an attacker control over the website. Both of those are types of vulnerabilities that are the kind that are often thought of when discussing the security of websites, for example the very popular Wordfence plugin is advertised as “protecting your website from hacks and malware”. Not every security issue though falls into those categories. As you can guess from the name, an information disclosure vulnerability involves the disclosure of information that isn’t intended to be public and those can be a serious issue. For example, if you run an eCommerce you wouldn’t want your customers’ details to be accessible by the public.
WooCommerce is an popular eCommerce plugin for WordPress, which has over 1+ million active installs according to wordpress.org (we use it on this website). There are numerous plugins that expand on its functionality. The security of those isn’t always good. Among the issue we have found in some of those plugins this year were two arbitrary file upload vulnerabilities and a vulnerability that allowed changing the price of products. Recently David Peltier discovered that the plugin Order / Coupon / Subscription Export Import Plugin for WooCommerce (BASIC) had an information disclosure vulnerability that allowed anyone to get a copy of the orders made through WooCommerce on the website. Including in that is not only the details of the order, but the customer’s details, including address and email adress. That vulnerability has now been fixed.
Based on those vulnerabilities in WooCommerce related plugins, it is clear that plugins on websites that likely contain sensitive data are not receiving the security scrutiny that they should be. So if WordPress security plugins provided protection against information disclosure vulnerabilities that could be of significant value.
Testing Procedure
For each of the tested plugin we set up a fresh install of WordPress 4.6.1, installed the version 1.0.8 of Order / Coupon / Subscription Export Import Plugin for WooCommerce (BASIC), and installed the latest version of the security plugin. We tried to enable any feature of the plugin that could possibly have an impact on stopping exploitation of the vulnerability.
We used the proof of concept included in the report on the vulnerability.
The 12 plugins we tested include the security plugins listed in the Popular plugins section of the Plugin Directory and some others that look to intended to prevent this type of situation. If you would like to see an additional plugin included in future testing please leave a comment on the post or contact us.
Results
None of the plugins tested prevent the vulnerability from being exploited.
The full results are below:
Acunetix Secure WordPress
- WordPress.org Plugin Directory page
- Active Installs: 70,000+
- Version Tested: 3.0.4
Result: Failed to prevent exploitation.
Acunetix WP Security
- WordPress.org Plugin Directory page
- Active Installs: 100,000+
- Version Tested: 4.0.5
Result: Failed to prevent exploitation.
All In One WP Security & Firewall
- WordPress.org Plugin Directory page
- Active Installs: 400,000+
- Version Tested: 4.1.5
Result: Failed to prevent exploitation.
Anti-Malware Security and Brute-Force Firewall
- WordPress.org Plugin Directory page
- Active Installs: 100,000+
- Version Tested: 4.16.39
Result: Failed to prevent exploitation.
BulletProof Security
- WordPress.org Plugin Directory page
- Active Installs: 100,000+
- Version Tested: .54
Result: Failed to prevent exploitation.
IP Geo Block
- WordPress.org Plugin Directory page
- Active Installs: 10,000+
- Version Tested: 2.2.8
Result: Failed to prevent exploitation.
iThemes Security
- WordPress.org Plugin Directory page
- Active Installs: 800,000+
- Version Tested: 5.6.1
Result: Failed to prevent exploitation.
NinjaFirewall (WP Edition)
- WordPress.org Plugin Directory page
- Active Installs: 10,000+
- Version Tested: 3.2.6
Result: Failed to prevent exploitation.
Security Ninja
- WordPress.org Plugin Directory page
- Active Installs: 5,000+
- Version Tested: 2.05
Result: Failed to prevent exploitation.
Shield WordPress Security
- WordPress.org Plugin Directory page
- Active Installs: 40,000+
- Version Tested: 5.5.1
Result: Failed to prevent exploitation.
Sucuri Security
- WordPress.org Plugin Directory page
- Active Installs: 200,000+
- Version Tested: 1.8.1
Result: Failed to prevent exploitation.
Wordfence
- WordPress.org Plugin Directory page
- Active Installs: 1+ million
- Version Tested: 6.1.17
Result: Failed to prevent exploitation.
Protecting Against Plugin Vulnerabilities
Seeing as the security plugins provided no protection, there are a number of other steps you can take to lessen the chances of being exploited through a vulnerability in a plugin:
- Remove plugins that you are not planning to use anymore. Some vulnerabilities are exploitable even if the plugin is not activated, so just deactivating them will not fully protect you.
- Keep your plugins up to date. Unless you are constantly checking for outdated plugins, your best bet is probably to enable WordPress’ ability to update them automatically. Our Automatic Plugin Updates plugin is one option for doing that.
- Install our Plugin Vulnerabilities plugin. For vulnerabilities that it looks like a hacker is already exploiting, we include data on that in the plugin and you will get alerted to the situation even if you don’t use the service.
- Sign up for our service. Not only do get alerted if there is a vulnerability in the currently installed plugin, but we can also work with you to determine what is the best option for dealing with that situation. Maybe the vulnerability is something you can safely ignore or we can create a workaround to prevent exploitation until a proper fix is released. Your support of the service also help us to continue to work to get these types of vulnerabilities fixed.
- Hire someone to do a security review done on the plugins you use. This is the most expensive option, but it also going to provide you the highest level of protection. It also will help everyone else using the same plugins.
Plugin Security Scorecard Grade for BulletProof Security
Checked on November 19, 2024See issues causing the plugin to get less than A+ grade
Plugin Security Scorecard Grade for NinjaFirewall (WP Edition)
Checked on April 1, 2025See issues causing the plugin to get less than A+ grade
Plugin Security Scorecard Grade for Security Ninja
Checked on April 1, 2025See issues causing the plugin to get less than A+ grade