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CVE-2026-54824 – Unauthenticated Sensitive Data Exposure – Ads by WPQuads WordPress Plugin <= 3.0.3

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Summary

CVE-2026-54824 describes an Unauthenticated Sensitive Data Exposure in the Ads by WPQuads WordPress plugin (also known as Quads Ads Manager for Google AdSense), affecting all versions up to and including 3.0.3. The vulnerability arises from broken access control, allowing any unauthenticated remote attacker to access sensitive data over the network without requiring any privileges or user interaction. With a CVSS v3.1 base score of 7.5 (HIGH) and over 20,000 active WordPress installations running this plugin, the potential exposure across internet-facing sites is significant.

Technical details

  • Root cause: Broken access control within the plugin fails to enforce authentication checks on one or more endpoints or AJAX actions, permitting unauthenticated access to data that should require authentication.
  • Trigger conditions: An attacker sends a crafted network request to the vulnerable endpoint — no credentials, session token, or victim interaction are required.
  • Attack vector: Fully remote and network-accessible (AV:N); low attack complexity (AC:L); no privileges required (PR:N); no user interaction required (UI:N).
  • Impact: High confidentiality impact (C:H) — sensitive data is exposed to unauthenticated remote attackers. There is no integrity or availability impact (I:N / A:N).

Affected software

  • Ads by WPQuads (WordPress plugin slug: quick-adsense-reloaded), all versions <= 3.0.3

Severity

  • CVSS v3.1 Base Score: 7.5 (HIGH)
  • Vector String: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N

Mitigation and recommended actions

  • Immediate action: Update the Ads by WPQuads plugin to version 3.0.4 or later, which contains the vendor-issued fix (released June 12, 2026).
  • Administrators unable to update immediately should consider deactivating the plugin until the patch can be applied.
  • Review server logs for unexpected unauthenticated requests targeting plugin endpoints (such as /wp-admin/admin-ajax.php or plugin-specific REST routes) as a potential indicator of exploitation attempts.

IONIX Status

The IONIX research team is tracking ongoing exploitation attempts and recommends immediate patching. Potentially affected assets are outlined in this post.

References

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Map your entire attack surface (continously)

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6

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Results are routed through integrations with ticketing, SOAR, and SIEM tools. Issues are written in plain language, bundled into remediation clusters, and prioritized based on asset criticality, exploitability, and blast radius. This shortens mean time to remediation (MTTR) and empowers teams to act with confidence.

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