License Security & Risk Analysis

wordpress.org/plugins/license

The license plugin gives authors the ability to mark their content with a Creative Commons license and to display the license along with the content.

20 active installs v0.5 PHP + WP 3.1+ Updated Nov 22, 2013
cccopyleftcopyrightcreative-commonslicense
85
A · Safe
CVEs total0
Unpatched0
Last CVENever
Download
Safety Verdict

Is License Safe to Use in 2026?

Generally Safe

Score 85/100

License has no known CVEs and is actively maintained. It's a solid choice for most WordPress installations.

No known CVEs Updated 12yr ago
Risk Assessment

The "license" v0.5 plugin exhibits a strong security posture based on the provided static analysis. The absence of any identified AJAX handlers, REST API routes, shortcodes, or cron events significantly limits the plugin's attack surface. Furthermore, the analysis indicates a conscientious approach to coding, with no dangerous functions, no direct SQL queries susceptible to injection (all use prepared statements), and no file operations or external HTTP requests. The presence of nonce and capability checks, although limited in number, also suggests an awareness of WordPress security best practices. The vulnerability history is completely clean, with zero recorded CVEs, which is a very positive indicator of past security diligence. The only area of concern, albeit minor, is the 43% rate of properly escaped output. While not ideal, it's not a critical flaw given the small number of total outputs and the lack of exploitable taint flows.

Key Concerns

  • Output escaping is not consistently applied
Vulnerabilities
None known

License Security Vulnerabilities

No known vulnerabilities — this is a good sign.
Version History

License Release Timeline

v0.5Current
v0.4
v0.3
Code Analysis
Analyzed Mar 16, 2026

License Code Analysis

Dangerous Functions
0
Raw SQL Queries
0
0 prepared
Unescaped Output
8
6 escaped
Nonce Checks
1
Capability Checks
2
File Operations
0
External Requests
0
Bundled Libraries
0

Output Escaping

43% escaped14 total outputs
Data Flows · Security
1 unsanitized

Data Flow Analysis

1 flows1 with unsanitized paths
<licensereturn> (licensereturn.php:0)
Source (user input) Sink (dangerous op) Sanitizer Transform Unsanitized Sanitized
Attack Surface

License Attack Surface

Entry Points0
Unprotected0
WordPress Hooks 9
actionadmin_initlicense.php:12
actioninitlicense.php:21
actionpost_submitbox_misc_actionslicense.php:33
actionpage_submitbox_misc_actionslicense.php:34
actionsave_postlicense.php:35
actionpersonal_optionslicense.php:36
actionpersonal_options_updatelicense.php:37
actionwidgets_initlicense.php:204
actionwp_footerlicense.php:224
Maintenance & Trust

License Maintenance & Trust

Maintenance Signals

WordPress version tested3.7.41
Last updatedNov 22, 2013
PHP min version
Downloads5K

Community Trust

Rating60/100
Number of ratings1
Active installs20
Developer Profile

License Developer Profile

mitcho (Michael Yoshitaka Erlewine)

14 plugins · 6K total installs

84
trust score
Avg Security Score
85/100
Avg Patch Time
30 days
View full developer profile
Detection Fingerprints

How We Detect License

Patterns used to identify this plugin on WordPress sites during automated security audits and web crawling.

Asset Fingerprints

Asset Paths
/wp-content/plugins/license/admin.js
Script Paths
/wp-content/plugins/license/admin.js

HTML / DOM Fingerprints

CSS Classes
misc-pub-sectionmisc-pub-section-lastedit-license
HTML Comments
<!-- <p> <a class="save-post-license hide-if-no-js button" href="#license">OK</a> <a class="cancel-post-license hide-if-no-js" href="#license">Cancel</a> </p> -->
Data Attributes
id="license"id="license-display"class="thickbox edit-license"id="license-nonce"name="license_nonce"id="hidden-license-deed"+6 more
JS Globals
var license_displaynamevar license_nickname
FAQ

Frequently Asked Questions about License