CVE-2016-15042 – WordPress Frontend File Manager & N‑Media Post Front‑end Form Unauthenticated File Upload (PoC Lab)

Fully reproducible, Dockerized lab to validate and demonstrate CVE-2016-15042:

• Frontend File Manager (nmedia-user-file-uploader) v3.7 (vulnerable < 4.0)
• N‑Media Post Front‑end Form (wp-post-frontend) v1.0 (vulnerable < 1.1)

This repo provides a one-command setup, verification steps with Nuclei, and artifacts for reviewers. Keywords: WordPress, CVE-2016-15042, unauthenticated file upload, arbitrary file upload, PoC, security lab, Docker.

Requirements

• Docker + Docker Compose plugin
• curl
• Nuclei (optional, for verification)

Quick start

./scripts/setup.sh

Once finished:

• WordPress: http://localhost:8090
• Admin: admin / admin
• Public user: publicuser / publicpass

Verify the vulnerability with Nuclei (debug enabled)

Option A: Download the template locally into this lab folder and run it.

curl -sL "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/projectdiscovery/nuclei-templates/refs/heads/main/http/cves/2016/CVE-2016-15042.yaml" -o ./CVE-2016-15042.yaml
nuclei -t ./CVE-2016-15042.yaml -u http://localhost:8090 -debug -vv \
  | tee ./debug/CVE-2016-15042-debug.txt

Option B: If you have the templates repo locally, run the template by path:

nuclei -t /path/to/nuclei-templates/http/cves/2016/CVE-2016-15042.yaml -u http://localhost:8090 -debug -vv \
  | tee ./debug/CVE-2016-15042-debug.txt

The debug output file is stored at ./debug/CVE-2016-15042-debug.txt for reviewers.

What this lab does

• Boots a clean WordPress with the two vulnerable plugins
• Configures guest uploads for Frontend File Manager for reliable unauthenticated testing
• Exposes WordPress on localhost:8090

Notes

• If ports or credentials collide in your setup, edit docker-compose.yml and re-run the script.
• Artifacts are kept under ./debug/ for easy PR review.

References

• NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2016-15042
• Plugin Vulnerabilities (Frontend File Manager): https://www.pluginvulnerabilities.com/2016/09/19/arbitrary-file-upload-vulnerability-in-front-end-file-upload-and-manager-plugin/
• Plugin Vulnerabilities (N‑Media Post Front‑end Form): https://www.pluginvulnerabilities.com/2016/09/19/arbitrary-file-upload-vulnerability-in-n-media-post-front-end-form/