CVE-2017-5490 — Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in the theme-name fallback functionalit

Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in the theme-name fallback functionality in wp-includes/class-wp-theme.php in WordPress before 4.7.1 allows remote attackers to inject arbitrary web script or HTML via a crafted directory name of a theme, related to wp-admin/includes/class

01What is this vulnerability?

Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in the theme-name fallback functionality in wp-includes/class-wp-theme.php in WordPress before 4.7.1 allows remote attackers to inject arbitrary web script or HTML via a crafted directory name of a theme, related to wp-admin/includes/class-theme-installer-skin.php.

02Affected products

No structured affected-product list available — see references below for vendor advisories.

03Active exploitation status

Not currently listed on the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog. EPSS is the best forward-looking signal — see the EPSS row above.

04Recommended remediation

• Patch to a fixed version listed in the vendor advisory (see references below).
• Mitigate with WAF rules, network egress filters, or feature flags where the patch is not yet available.
• Hunt historical logs for exploitation indicators — see Detection signatures below.

05Technical details

For the full vendor write-up, exploit chains, and reference implementations, see the references list in section 09.

06Detection signatures

Ask SARA in chat to draft a starting detection for this CVE in your stack of choice.

07Related CVEs

No directly-cited follow-up CVEs in the KB record for this advisory. The references list in section 09 carries the vendor cross-references.

08Timeline

• Published: 2017-01-15T02:59:02.937
• Last modified: 2026-05-13T00:24:29.033

09References

• www.debian.org — http://www.debian.org/security/2017/dsa-3779
• www.openwall.com — http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2017/01/14/6
• www.securityfocus.com — http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/95402
• www.securitytracker.com — http://www.securitytracker.com/id/1037591
• codex.wordpress.org — https://codex.wordpress.org/Version_4.7.1
• github.com — https://github.com/WordPress/WordPress/commit/ce7fb2934dd111e6353784852de8aea2a9…
• wordpress.org — https://wordpress.org/news/2017/01/wordpress-4-7-1-security-and-maintenance-rele…
• wpvulndb.com — https://wpvulndb.com/vulnerabilities/8718
• www.mehmetince.net — https://www.mehmetince.net/low-severity-wordpress/
• www.debian.org — http://www.debian.org/security/2017/dsa-3779