CVE-2023-6989

Q: How do I fix CVE-2023-6989?

Upgrade shield security to 18.5.10 or later.

Q: Is CVE-2023-6989 being actively exploited?

Not that we know of. CVE-2023-6989 is not in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog. Its EPSS score of 56.6% is the estimated probability that it will be exploited in the next 30 days. That is higher than 99% of all scored CVEs.

Q: How severe is CVE-2023-6989?

CVE-2023-6989 has a CVSS v3 base score of 9.8, rated critical. CVSS rates the technical impact if the vulnerability is exploited, not how likely that is, so weigh it alongside the exploit-prediction score when you decide what to patch first.

Q: What does CVE-2023-6989 affect?

Published advisories record a fix for shield security (NVD). Only products with a sourced advisory are listed, so treat this as what we can cite rather than a complete inventory.

CRITICALEPSS 99th pctl

9.8

CVSS v3

NVD

Description

The Shield Security – Smart Bot Blocking & Intrusion Prevention Security plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Local File Inclusion in all versions up to, and including, 18.5.9 via the render_action_template parameter. This makes it possible for unauthenticated attacker to include and execute PHP files on the server, allowing the execution of any PHP code in those files.

CWE-98 CWE-22Path Traversal

How to fix

Remediation Available

shield securityNVD

Affected:< 18.5.10Fixed in:18.5.10CVE-2023-6989derived from NVD

TridentStack Control can deploy fixes like this automatically across your Windows, macOS, and Linux fleet. See how it works

Remediation is compiled from vendor and distribution security advisories. Always confirm against the linked source for your exact version and platform.

CVSS v3 Vector

Exploitability

Attack VectorNetwork

Attack ComplexityLow

Privileges RequiredNone

User InteractionNone

ScopeUnchanged

Impact

ConfidentialityHigh

IntegrityHigh

AvailabilityHigh

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Exploit Intelligence

56.57%probability of exploitation in 30 days

99thpercentile

Very high risk: more likely to be exploited than 99% of all known CVEs.

References

Patch2

Related Vulnerabilities

Other CWE-98 vulnerabilities, ordered by exploit likelihood. View all

CVE	Severity	CVSS	EPSS	Exploited	Fix
CVE-2024-5762	High	8.1	72%	-	-
CVE-2023-49084	High	8.0	64%	-	Fix
CVE-2023-2249	High	8.8	61%	-	-
CVE-2022-4606	Critical	9.8	35%	-	-
CVE-2024-1600	Critical	9.3	33%	-	Fix
CVE-2025-68645	High	8.8	32%	KEV	Fix

Common questions

How do I fix CVE-2023-6989?

Upgrade shield security to 18.5.10 or later.

Is CVE-2023-6989 being actively exploited?

Not that we know of. CVE-2023-6989 is not in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog. Its EPSS score of 56.6% is the estimated probability that it will be exploited in the next 30 days. That is higher than 99% of all scored CVEs.

How severe is CVE-2023-6989?

CVE-2023-6989 has a CVSS v3 base score of 9.8, rated critical. CVSS rates the technical impact if the vulnerability is exploited, not how likely that is, so weigh it alongside the exploit-prediction score when you decide what to patch first.

What does CVE-2023-6989 affect?

Published advisories record a fix for shield security (NVD). Only products with a sourced advisory are listed, so treat this as what we can cite rather than a complete inventory.

Embed a live status badge for CVE-2023-6989

Markdown

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This product uses NVD data but is not endorsed or certified by the NVD. EPSS scores courtesy of FIRST.org (https://www.first.org/epss). Source: CISA KEV Catalog. Data as of 2026-04-08.