# CVE-2026-4301: Missing authorization in Rate Star Review Vote – AJAX Reviews, Votes, Star Ratings

> Authenticated subscribers can modify arbitrary posts and pages due to missing authorization checks in the Rate Star Review Vote plugin.

- **Severity:** Medium 4.3 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Any signed-in user
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** No
- **Published:** 12 May 2026
- **Updated:** 12 May 2026
- **Also known as:** GHSA-vpjj-cp57-c66r

## What is CVE-2026-4301?

CVE-2026-4301 is a medium-severity missing authorization vulnerability in videowhisper Rate Star Review Vote – AJAX Reviews, Votes, Star Ratings, published on 12 May 2026. Any signed-in user can exploit it over the network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

The Rate Star Review Vote - AJAX Reviews, Votes, Star Ratings plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Missing Authorization in all versions up to and including 1.6.4. The vwrsr_review() AJAX handler lacks both capability checks and nonce verification. The only access control is an is_user_logged_in() check. When the 'form' parameter is set to 'update', the function takes an arbitrary post ID from the user-supplied 'rating_id' GET parameter, sets it as the post ID in the update array, and passes it directly to wp_update_post(). This overwrites the target post's title, content, author (changed to the attacker's user ID), post_type (changed to the plugin's custom post type, default 'review'), and status. Additionally, update_post_meta() is called on the arbitrary post ID at lines 758-763, modifying its metadata. This makes it possible for authenticated attackers, with Subscriber-level access and above, to modify the title, content, author, post type, and metadata of arbitrary posts and pages on the site via the 'rating_id' parameter, effectively allowing full post content takeover.

Weakness: CWE-862 (Missing Authorization)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-4301?


## How do I fix CVE-2026-4301?

No fix has been published for CVE-2026-4301 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2026-4301 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-4301 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2026-4301 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2026-4301 is a medium-severity missing authorization vulnerability in videowhisper Rate Star Review Vote – AJAX Reviews, Votes, Star Ratings, published on 12 May 2026. Any signed-in user can exploit it over the network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-4301 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: videowhisper Rate Star Review Vote – AJAX Reviews, Votes, Star Ratings. 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-2026-4301/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-4301/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-4301
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-4301
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2026-4301

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From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-4301/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.