Introduction
Sensitive WordPress site data can be exposed to anyone with a basic user account when SQL injection flaws slip through plugin development. CVE-2025-10587 in the Community Events plugin demonstrates how even Subscriber-level users can exploit insufficient input validation to extract or manipulate database contents in all versions up to and including 1.5.1.
Community Events is a third-party WordPress plugin designed to provide event management features for WordPress sites. While not as widely adopted as flagship plugins like The Events Calendar, it has been used on a significant number of community and organizational websites. The plugin has a history of SQL injection vulnerabilities, raising persistent concerns about its security maturity and maintenance.
Technical Information
CVE-2025-10587 is a critical SQL injection vulnerability in the Community Events plugin for WordPress, affecting all versions up to and including 1.5.1. The vulnerability is present in the handling of the event_category parameter. When this parameter is processed, user-supplied input is concatenated directly into SQL queries without proper escaping or use of prepared statements. This allows authenticated attackers (Subscriber-level or above) to inject arbitrary SQL code.
The root cause is the failure to sanitize and parameterize the event_category input before it is included in SQL statements. This is a recurring pattern in the plugin, as seen in prior vulnerabilities involving the eventyear and id parameters. Attackers can craft input such as 1 OR 1=1 or more complex payloads to manipulate the query logic, extract sensitive information, or modify database contents.
Automated tools like SQLMap can be used to exploit this vulnerability, as demonstrated in previous Community Events plugin SQL injection cases. The attack surface is significant because Subscriber-level access is often easy to obtain on WordPress sites with open registration or weak credential management.
No public code snippets for the vulnerable SQL statements have been provided in the available sources, but references confirm the lack of sufficient escaping and query preparation in the plugin's codebase.
Affected Systems and Versions
- Community Events WordPress plugin, all versions up to and including 1.5.1
- Vulnerable in any configuration where authenticated users (Subscriber-level and above) can supply the
event_categoryparameter
Vendor Security History
Community Events has a documented pattern of SQL injection vulnerabilities:
- CVE-2015-3313 (version 1.3.5,
eventyearparameter) - SQL injection in
idparameter (version 1.2.2) - Multiple unauthenticated and authenticated SQL injection flaws reported by Acunetix and WPScan
The plugin has been removed from the WordPress repository, likely due to repeated unresolved security issues. This removal, combined with the history of similar vulnerabilities, indicates systemic weaknesses in secure coding and vendor response.
References
- NVD entry for CVE-2025-10587
- Community Events plugin source (WordPress SVN)
- Wordfence vulnerability advisory
- Acunetix vulnerability report
- Exploit-DB: Community Events 1.3.5 SQL Injection
- WPScan: Community Events < 1.2.3 SQL Injection
- WordPress.org plugin removal discussion
- WordPress.org plugin removal notice
