W3 Total Cache vulnerability

The W3 Total Cache plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Stored Cross-Site Scripting via Comment Content via Output-Buffer Regex Rewrite in all versions up to, and including, 2.10.6 due to insufficient input sanitization and output escaping. This makes it possible for unauthenticated attackers to inject arbitrary web scripts in pages that will execute whenever a user accesses an injected page. This vulnerability is only exploitable when the 'Remove query strings from static resources' option is enabled in W3 Total Cache, as mutate_url() must strip the '?' delimiter and everything following it — including the closing quote of the outer attribute — to break the attribute boundary.

Published 2 Oct 2026Updated 3 Oct 20266 sources
CVSS 7.2

What happened

The W3 Total Cache plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Stored Cross-Site Scripting via Comment Content via Output-Buffer Regex Rewrite in all versions up to, and including, 2.10.6 due to insufficient input sanitization and output escaping. This makes it possible for unauthenticated attackers to inject arbitrary web scripts in pages that will execute whenever a user accesses an injected page. This vulnerability is only exploitable when the 'Remove query strings from static resources' option is enabled in W3 Total Cache, as mutate_url() must strip the '?' delimiter and everything following it — including the closing quote of the outer attribute — to break the attribute boundary.

Affected versions

W3 Total Cache: 0 through 2.10.6 (semver) Fixed: See vendor advisory.

Why it matters

Review the vendor advisory and exposure of the affected product to determine operational impact.

Detection & mitigation

  • Apply vendor-provided updates or mitigations.
  • Review affected product exposure and access logs.

Public PoC references

No public PoC reference has passed the current publication threshold.