# WP Popular Posts <= 7.4.3 - Authenticated (Author+) Blind Server-Side Request Forgery via Post Image URLs

- **ID:** WPSEC-2026-2432
- **Plugin:** WP Popular Posts (`wordpress-popular-posts`), https://wordpress.org/plugins/wordpress-popular-posts/
- **Affected versions:** all versions before 7.4.4
- **Fixed in:** 7.4.4 (Update to 7.4.4 or later.)
- **Severity:** Medium 4.9 (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N)
- **Weakness:** CWE-918
- **Usage among sites WPSec scans:** plugin High, affected versions High (as of 2026-11-04)
- **Attack surface analysis:** https://attacksurface.wpsec.com/plugin/wordpress-popular-posts
- **Fix released:** 2026-11-02
- **Published:** 2026-11-03
- **URL:** https://wpsec.com/vuln/WPSEC-2026-2432/

## Description

The WP Popular Posts plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to blind Server-Side Request Forgery via external thumbnail images in all versions up to, and including, 7.4.3. This is due to the fetch_external_image() function sending a wp_remote_head() request to the image URL without the reject_unsafe_urls option and with SSL verification turned off. When the thumbnail source is set to 'First image on post' or 'Custom field', the URL comes from the post content or a custom field. This makes it possible for authenticated attackers, with author-level access and above, to publish a post with a crafted image URL, which makes the web server send HEAD requests to arbitrary locations, including internal and loopback hosts, whenever the post shows in a popular posts list.

## References

- https://wpsec.com/vuln/WPSEC-2026-2432/
- https://plugins.svn.wordpress.org/wordpress-popular-posts/tags/7.4.4/
- https://wordpress.org/plugins/wordpress-popular-posts/

Source: WPSec, https://wpsec.com/vuln/WPSEC-2026-2432/

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.