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high 3 October 2026 · Severity 8.8/10 · CVE-2026-86583

Import and export users and customers: privilege escalation

What's happening

Import and export users and customers has a privilege escalation flaw in every version up to 2.4.17 (included): a low-privileged user can grant themselves administrator rights. It requires a user account, even the most basic one (subscriber): it matters most on sites with open registration, such as shops and membership sites. More than 70,000 websites use it.

What to do

Update Import and export users and customers to version 2.4.18 or later (Dashboard → Plugins in WordPress). If you can't update yet, deactivate it until you can.

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Source: Wordfence Intelligence (Defiant, Inc.). Original record · CVE-2026-86583. Original title: «Import and export users and customers <= 2.4.17 - Authenticated (Subscriber+) Privilege Escalation via CSV Escape-Character Mismatch in Export/Import Round Trip via display_name and nickname Profile Fields».

Data licence

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