CVE-2020-35948
An issue was discovered in the XCloner Backup and Restore plugin before 4.2.13 for WordPress. It gave authenticated attackers the ability…
- 9.9CriticalCVSS base score
- 24.9%Exploitation in 30 daysEPSS · top 2.1% of all CVEs
- NoKnown exploitednot in CISA's KEV catalog
- 1Public exploitsMetasploit, Nuclei and Exploit-DB
Description
An issue was discovered in the XCloner Backup and Restore plugin before 4.2.13 for WordPress. It gave authenticated attackers the ability to modify arbitrary files, including PHP files. Doing so would allow an attacker to achieve remote code execution. The xcloner_restore.php write_file_action could overwrite wp-config.php, for example. Alternatively, an attacker could create an exploit chain to obtain a database dump.
Public exploit
An exploit or proof of concept is public: anyone can try it against an unpatched system. The public collections list an Exploit-DB entry for it.
Show the exploits1
Exploit-DB1 entry
- Wordpress Plugin XCloner 4.2.12 - Remote Code Execution (Authenticated) (Exploit-DB entry) (opens in a new tab)
EDB-ID 50077webapps, phppublished 1 Jul 2021Not verified
Modules, templates and exploits as listed by the Metasploit Framework (BSD-3-Clause), ProjectDiscovery's Nuclei templates (MIT) and the Exploit Database (GPLv2), read once a day. Where the data comes from
Timeline
ID reserved
By mitre
Published
- 4 years later
· 4 years later
Record updated
Changes after publication (a new score, a public exploit, EPSS crossing 1, 10 or 50 %, leaving KEV) are kept since November 2026; earlier ones are not known.
Scores
| Scored by | CVSS | Score | Vector |
|---|---|---|---|
| mitreCNA (assigner) | 3.1 | Critical9.9 | CVSS:3.1/AC:L/AV:N/A:H/C:H/I:H/PR:L/S:C/UI:N |
| NVDNVD · Modified | 3.1 | High8.8 | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H |
- EPSS (exploitation in 30 days)
- 24.9% · top 2.1% of all CVEs (10 Nov 2026)
The list uses the assigner's score when there is one, then CISA's, then NVD's: Critical 9.9.
Affected products
n/a
- affected n/a
References
4
- https://www.wordfence.com/blog/2020/09/critical-vulnerabilities-patched-in-xcloner-backup-and-restore-plugin/ (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
- https://wpscan.com/vulnerability/10412 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
- http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/163336/WordPress-XCloner-4.2.12-Remote-Code-Execution.html (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
- https://github.com/Hacker5preme/Exploits/tree/main/Wordpress/CVE-2020-35948 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
Sources
The same CVE in the primary databases and aggregators, to check against.
- CVE.org record (opens in a new tab)
- CVE List JSON (GitHub) (opens in a new tab)
- NVD (opens in a new tab)
- FIRST EPSS (opens in a new tab)
- EUVD EUVD-2020-23531 (opens in a new tab)
- OSV.dev (opens in a new tab)
- GitHub Advisories (opens in a new tab)
- CIRCL Vulnerability-Lookup (opens in a new tab)
Badge for a README or a ticket
[](https://cveledger.app/cve/CVE-2020-35948)Record last updated .