A concerning large-scale phishing campaign targeting WooCommerce users has been uncovered by the Patchstack securpity team, employing a highly sophisticated email and web-based phishing template to deceive website owners.
The attackers behind this operation warn users of a fabricated “Unauthenticated Administrative Access” vulnerability in their WooCommerce installations, urging them to download a supposed patch from a malicious website.
Sophisticated Phishing Campaign Mimics Official Alerts
Strikingly similar to the previously reported “Fake CVE” phishing attack on WordPress users, this campaign uses near-identical email formatting, security-themed messaging, and malware concealment techniques, suggesting it may be orchestrated by the same group or heavily inspired by their methods.
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The phishing email, masquerading as an official WooCommerce alert, originates from a deceptive address, help@security-woocommerce[.]com, and directs users to a fraudulent site using an IDN homograph attack with the domain woocommėrce[.]com note the subtle “ė” replacing the standard “e” to mimic the legitimate WooCommerce Marketplace.
Technical Breakdown of the Malicious Payload
Clicking the “Download Patch” button in the email leads victims to a counterfeit WooCommerce Marketplace page, where they are prompted to download a malicious ZIP file named authbypass-update-31297-id.zip.
Once installed and activated as a plugin, this file operates covertly, leveraging legitimate WordPress hooks to disguise its nefarious activities.
Upon activation, the plugin creates a cronjob with a randomized name like “mergeCreator655” in WP Cron, attempting every minute to generate a hidden administrator account with an obfuscated username and random password.
It then sends base64-encoded data including the new credentials and site URL to an attacker-controlled server, woocommerce-services[.]com/wpapi, via an HTTP GET request.
Further, the plugin downloads additional obfuscated payloads from domains such as woocommerce-help[.]com/activate and woocommerce-api[.]com/activate, installing multiple PHP-based web shells like P.A.S.-Fork, p0wny, and WSO into a directory named wp-cached-<random string> within wp-content/uploads.
These shells grant attackers near-total control over the compromised server, enabling potential exploits such as injecting ads, redirecting users to malicious sites, stealing billing data, launching DDoS attacks, or deploying ransomware by encrypting the site or holding database backups hostage.
According to Patchstack Report, the plugin also hides itself from the WordPress plugin list and conceals the rogue administrator account to evade detection.
Importantly, this campaign poses no threat unless the malicious plugin is downloaded and installed.
Neither WordPress nor WooCommerce would ever request manual patch installations; legitimate updates are always released through official channels as version updates.
Indicators of compromise include an 8-character random username, unusual cronjob names, suspicious folders like authbypass-update in wp-content/plugins, or outgoing requests to domains like woocommerce-services[.]com.
As awareness of this scam spreads, attackers are likely to adapt, changing domain names and other markers to bypass flagging by security services and registrars.
Website owners are urged to remain vigilant, scrutinize emails claiming urgent security fixes, and rely solely on official sources for updates to protect their WooCommerce installations from such deceptive and damaging phishing tactics.
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