What is CVE-2026-16940?

CVE-2026-16940 is a critical-severity vulnerability in Custom Fields, classified under Path Traversal. CVSS score: 10.0/10. Published 2026-08-05.

How severe is CVE-2026-16940?

Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 10.0 out of 10.

Path Traversal in Custom Fields

CVE-2026-16940

The Custom Fields WordPress plugin before 1.5.1 does not validate a user-supplied file path before deletion, allowing unauthenticated users to delete arbitrary files on the server (such as wp-config.php), which can lead to a full site takeover.

Vulnerability class: Path Traversal (Directory Traversal)

EPSS: 0.004 (34.0th percentile) — read the EPSS interpretation.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 10.0 (Critical). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:H/A:H.

Affected products

Unknown Custom Fields — versions 0

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-22 — Path Traversal

References

contact@wpscan.com (technical-description, exploit, vdb-entry)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2026-16940?: CVE-2026-16940 is a critical-severity vulnerability in Custom Fields, classified under Path Traversal. CVSS score: 10.0/10. Published 2026-08-05.
How severe is CVE-2026-16940?: Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 10.0 out of 10.