# CVE-2026-14936: Simple Membership < 4.7.7 - Unauthenticated Payment Bypass via Missing PayPal IPN Receiver Verification

> Unauthenticated attackers can bypass payment verification to activate or extend memberships by sending fake PayPal notifications, affecting Simple Membership plugin users.

- **Severity:** Medium 5.3 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Not needed
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** No
- **Published:** 6 Aug 2026
- **Updated:** 7 Aug 2026
- **Also known as:** GHSA-rx87-886c-g6fw

## What is CVE-2026-14936?

CVE-2026-14936 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Unknown Simple Membership, published on 6 Aug 2026. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

The Simple Membership WordPress plugin before 4.7.7 does not verify that a PayPal payment notification was sent to the site's own configured merchant account before activating a membership, allowing unauthenticated users to activate or extend a membership using a payment made to an arbitrary PayPal account they control.

Weakness: CWE-345 (Insufficient Verification of Data Authenticity)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-14936?


## How do I fix CVE-2026-14936?

No fix has been published for CVE-2026-14936 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2026-14936 being exploited?

It is not confirmed as exploited in the wild, but public exploit code for CVE-2026-14936 exists.

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2026-14936 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2026-14936 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Unknown Simple Membership, published on 6 Aug 2026. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: It is not confirmed as exploited in the wild, but public exploit code for CVE-2026-14936 exists.

Affected product: Unknown Simple Membership. 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-2026-14936/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-14936/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-14936
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-14936
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2026-14936

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-14936/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.