What is CVE-2019-12468?

CVE-2019-12468 is a critical-severity vulnerability in MediaWiki, classified under Missing Authentication for Critical Function. CVSS score: 9.8/10. Published 2019-07-10.

How severe is CVE-2019-12468?

Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 9.8 out of 10.

Auth bypass in MediaWiki

CVE-2019-12468

An Incorrect Access Control vulnerability was found in Wikimedia MediaWiki 1.27.0 through 1.32.1. Directly POSTing to Special:ChangeEmail would allow for bypassing re-authentication, allowing for potential account takeover.

Vulnerability class: Broken Authentication

Published 2019-07-10 · last modified 2026-06-17.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 9.8 (Critical). Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.033 (88.3th percentile), scored 2026-10-07.

Low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, but still tracked. 88th percentile — 88.3% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.034 · newest: 0.033 · change: -0.001

Affected products

MediaWiki
Debian Linux — versions 9.0

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-306 — Missing Authentication for Critical Function

References

lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/mediawiki-announce/ (Third Party Advisory)
www.debian.org/security/2019/dsa-4460 (vendor-advisory, Third Party Advisory)
seclists.org/bugtraq/2019/Jun/12 (mailing-list, Mailing List, Third Party Advisory)
phabricator.wikimedia.org/T197279 (Patch, Third Party Advisory)
lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2019-June/092152.html (Patch, Third Party Advisory)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2019-12468?: CVE-2019-12468 is a critical-severity vulnerability in MediaWiki, classified under Missing Authentication for Critical Function. CVSS score: 9.8/10. Published 2019-07-10.
How severe is CVE-2019-12468?: Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 9.8 out of 10.