# Rank Math SEO <= 1.0.279 - Missing Authorization to Unauthenticated SEO Analyzer Results Deletion

- **ID:** WPSEC-2026-0540
- **Plugin:** Rank Math SEO – AI SEO Tools to Dominate SEO Rankings (`seo-by-rank-math`), https://wordpress.org/plugins/seo-by-rank-math/
- **Affected versions:** from 1.0.31 before 1.0.280
- **Fixed in:** 1.0.280 (Update to 1.0.280 or later.)
- **Severity:** Medium 5.3 (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N)
- **Weakness:** CWE-862
- **Usage among sites WPSec scans:** plugin Medium, affected versions Medium (as of 2026-10-07)
- **Attack surface analysis:** https://attacksurface.wpsec.com/plugin/seo-by-rank-math
- **Fix released:** 2026-10-06
- **Published:** 2026-10-07
- **URL:** https://wpsec.com/vuln/WPSEC-2026-0540/

## Description

The Rank Math SEO plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to unauthorized modification of data due to a missing capability check on the SEO Analyzer's 'clear_results' handler in all versions up to, and including, 1.0.279. The handler ran whenever the SEO Analyzer was loaded, including on every admin-ajax.php request, and checked neither a capability nor a nonce. The SEO Analyzer module is enabled by default. This makes it possible for unauthenticated attackers to delete the site's stored SEO Analyzer results.

## References

- https://wpsec.com/vuln/WPSEC-2026-0540/
- https://plugins.svn.wordpress.org/seo-by-rank-math/tags/1.0.280/
- https://wordpress.org/plugins/seo-by-rank-math/

Source: WPSec, https://wpsec.com/vuln/WPSEC-2026-0540/

License: CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Free to use, share and adapt, also commercially, if you credit WPSec and link to this advisory.