# CVE-2025-53243: Deserialization in Employee Directory – Staff Listing & Team Directory Plugin for WordPress

> An attacker can exploit PHP object injection in the Employee Directory plugin to potentially execute arbitrary code on the WordPress site.

- **Severity:** High 8.1 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Not needed
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** No
- **Published:** 28 Aug 2025
- **Updated:** 28 Apr 2026
- **Also known as:** GHSA-qw3w-x3xf-gg83

## What is CVE-2025-53243?

CVE-2025-53243 is a high-severity unsafe deserialization vulnerability in emarket-design Employee Directory – Staff Listing & Team Directory Plugin for WordPress, published on 28 Aug 2025. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

Deserialization of Untrusted Data vulnerability in emarket-design Employee Directory – Staff Listing & Team Directory Plugin for WordPress employee-directory allows Object Injection.This issue affects Employee Directory – Staff Listing & Team Directory Plugin for WordPress: from n/a through <= 4.5.5.

Weakness: CWE-502 (Deserialization of Untrusted Data)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-53243?


## How do I fix CVE-2025-53243?

No fix has been published for CVE-2025-53243 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2025-53243 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-53243 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2025-53243 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2025-53243 is a high-severity unsafe deserialization vulnerability in emarket-design Employee Directory – Staff Listing & Team Directory Plugin for WordPress, published on 28 Aug 2025. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-53243 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: emarket-design Employee Directory – Staff Listing & Team Directory Plugin for WordPress. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-53243/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-53243/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2025-53243
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2025-53243
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2025-53243

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From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-53243/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.