What is CVE-2016-7038?

CVE-2016-7038 is a high-severity vulnerability in Moodle, classified under Weak Password Recovery Mechanism for Forgotten Password. CVSS score: 7.3/10. Published 2017-01-20.

How severe is CVE-2016-7038?

High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.3 out of 10.

Vulnerability in Moodle

CVE-2016-7038

In Moodle 2.x and 3.x, web service tokens are not invalidated when the user password is changed or forced to be changed.

Published 2017-01-20 · last modified 2026-06-17.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 7.3 (High). Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:L.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.010 (60.5th percentile), scored 2026-10-01.

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 61st percentile — 60.5% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.010 · newest: 0.010 · change: 0.000

Affected products

Moodle — versions 2.8.0, 2.8.1, 2.8.2
Moodle 2.x And 3.x — versions Moodle 2.x and 3.x

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-640 — Weak Password Recovery Mechanism for Forgotten Password

References

moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php (Patch, Vendor Advisory)
www.securityfocus.com/bid/93174 (VDB Entry, Third Party Advisory, vdb-entry)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2016-7038?: CVE-2016-7038 is a high-severity vulnerability in Moodle, classified under Weak Password Recovery Mechanism for Forgotten Password. CVSS score: 7.3/10. Published 2017-01-20.
How severe is CVE-2016-7038?: High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.3 out of 10.