CVE-2022-1165 | Blackhole for Bad Bots < 3.3.2 - Arbitrary IP Address Blocking via IP Spoofing

Exp

The Blackhole for Bad Bots WordPress plugin before 3.3.2 uses headers such as CF-CONNECTING-IP, CLIENT-IP etc to determine the IP address of requests hitting the blackhole URL, which allows them to be spoofed. This could result in blocking arbitrary IP addresses, such as legitimate/good search engine crawlers / bots. This could also be abused by competitors to cause damage related to visibility in search engines, can be used to bypass arbitrary blocks caused by this plugin, block any visitor or even the administrator and even more.

Published: 2022-04-04 Last update: 2024-11-21 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Modified，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2022-1165 is rated High Exploit Risk (78.5/100): CVSS Critical severity, with medium exploitation likelihood (EPSS 1.67%). 1 public exploit reference(s) are indexed (Exploit-DB). EPSS rose +1.34% over the last day, indicating growing attacker interest. Public exploits are available—assess exposure, apply mitigations, and prioritize patching.

Risk is dynamic; we continuously reassess and refresh what is shown on this page as upstream context changes.

Public exploit references (Exploit-DB) for CVE-2022-1165

EDB-ID Source Kind Published Link
— nvd_ref exploit_tag Exploit-DB ↗

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2022-1165

EPSS lead: Daily EPSS estimates relative likelihood of exploitation; percentile ranks this CVE among scored vulnerabilities (higher = more severe relative rank).

# Date Old EPSS score New EPSS score Delta (New - Old)
1 2026-06-15 0.33% 1.67% +1.34%
2 2025-07-22 0.19% 0.33% +0.14%
3 2025-07-08 — 0.19% —

Full EPSS history (11 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2022-1165

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
9.1 3.1 CRITICAL
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:H Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network—not just someone sitting at the machine.
Attack complexity (AC:L)
Once they can reach the bug, pulling it off is straightforward—no weird race conditions or rare setup.
Privileges required (PR:N)
No account or special rights needed—anonymous or random user is enough.
User interaction (UI:N)
Nobody has to click “OK” or open a trap file; it can work without a victim helping.
Scope (S:U)
Damage stays in the same “trust bubble” as the broken component—no big spill into unrelated systems.
Confidentiality (C:N)
Doesn’t really leak secrets in a meaningful way.
Integrity (I:H)
They could widely tamper with or forge data—trust in the data is badly hurt.
Availability (A:H)
Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.
 3.9 5.2 [email protected]
6.4 2.0 MEDIUM
AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:P/A:P Click to expand
Access vector (AV:N)
Can be exploited remotely over network reachability.
Access complexity (AC:L)
Exploitation conditions are straightforward and predictable.
Authentication (AU:N)
No authentication is required.
Confidentiality impact (C:N)
No confidentiality impact.
Integrity impact (I:P)
Partial integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:P)
Partial availability impact.
 10.0 4.9 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2022-1165

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2022-1165

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
plugin-planet blackhole_for_bad_bots < 3.3.2 cpe:2.3:a:plugin-planet:blackhole_for_bad_bots:*:*:*:*:*:wordpress:*:*

References for CVE-2022-1165

cvelogic Threat Intelligence