#217- WordPress 6.8.1 Release Scheduled For This Week, WooCommerce Phishing Campaign

Issue #217 | April 29, 2025 | Reading time: 14 mins

Hello!

This week on The WP Week Newsletter, we cover the upcoming WordPress 6.8.1 release, the phishing campaign targeting WooCommerce stores, new partnerships, acquisitions, and more.

Don’t forget to subscribe and listen to the podcast version of this newsletter, where you can hear more details and discussions about these topics and more.

See you next week!

Team WP-CONTENT.CO

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🗣️TALK OF THE TOWN

PressConf 2025 wraps up on a high note

PressConf 2025, the spiritual successor to PressNomics, brought together several members of the community for a unique, intimate event that left a lasting impression. Many attendees praised the thoughtfully curated experience, with Raquel Karina receiving appreciation for making the event possible. Katie Keith reflected on how PressConf stood out from larger events like WordCamps, highlighting its close-knit feel, focus on business conversations, and the depth of personal connections. Meanwhile, Rich Tabor noted how the unrecorded sessions sparked honest, often challenging discussions, especially around AI, making the event not just memorable but truly meaningful.

📰 WORDPRESS & AROUND

All the updates around WordPress and its closely related technologies

WordPress 6.8.1 release schedule

The RC1 is now available, and the general release is scheduled on April 30, 2025.

Reflecting: Matt Mullenweg talked about the frustration directed at him, about the passing of Pope Francis and its personal impact on him, along with how his creative work has been overtaken by legal battles with WP Engine, and them choosing to sue despite his good-faith efforts to negotiate, and about the need for a collective reflection and reset to preserve the open-source ecosystem.
Dev Advisory: Phishing campaign targeting WooCommerce stores: The Woo team has identified a phishing campaign targeting WooCommerce store owners. These emails falsely claim to be from WooCommerce and alert users about critical security vulnerabilities that don’t exist. The phishing emails come from suspicious domains like [email protected], [email protected], or [email protected].
WooCommerce is making issue tracking simpler and more effective: WooCommerce is streamlining its GitHub issue management by consolidating over 100 focus labels into approximately 20 product area labels, starting April 23rd. This will reduce complexity during issue triage, improve efficiency, and clarify product area designations. Additionally, priority labels will be removed, and internal tools will be used for prioritization.
Interesting WordPress malware disguised as legitimate anti-malware plugin: The Wordfence Threat Intelligence team recently discovered an interesting malware variant that appears in the file system as a normal WordPress plugin, often with the name ‘WP-antymalwary-bot.php’, and contains several functions that allow attackers to maintain access to your site, hide the plugin from the dashboard, and execute remote code.
Google Ads API v17 is going away soon: Google Ads API v17 will officially sunset June 4. Any requests made to it after that date will fail. If you haven’t upgraded yet, now’s the time.
Google’s AI Overviews reach 1.5 billion monthly users: Google AI Overviews reaches 1.5 billion monthly users with Alphabet’s Q1 earnings showing 10% search revenue growth.
Google quietly ends covid-era structured data support: Google announced that it is dropping support for the 2020 COVID-era Special Announcements structured data type and completely phasing it out by July 31, 2025.
Wix announces adaptive content for driving higher sales & engagement: Wix announced a new feature that enables businesses to create personalized content for visitors, increasing relevance and opportunities for higher sales and lead generation. The feature integrates AI into the workflow, making it easier for publishers to deliver advanced personalized experiences to returning customers.
OpenAI expresses interest in buying Chrome browser: Nick Turley, Head of Product at ChatGPT, testified that OpenAI would be interested in acquiring the Chrome browser should a judge decide to break it off from Alphabet, Google’s parent company.

💵 INVESTMENTS, ACQUISITIONS & PARTNERSHIPS

WooCommerce announced that it has expanded its partnership with Affirm Holdings, Inc: WooCommerce merchants in the UK can now seamlessly offer Affirm’s flexible and transparent payment options to consumers.
Masteriyo joins Themeisle: Masteriyo, the modern and user-friendly LMS plugin from ThemeGrill, is now officially part of the Themeisle product suite.
Socket acquires Coana to bring reachability analysis to every appsec team: Coana cybersecurity startup specializing in advanced open-source vulnerability scanning, has been acquired by Socket.
Resend has acquired Mergent: Mergent, a platform for developers to easily schedule crons and manage background jobs, has been acquired by Resend.

👥 COMMUNITY NEWS

Updates and News from the WordPress Community

May is Maintainer Month: Celebrating those who secure Open Source

Maintainer Month 2025, organized by GitHub and the Open Source Initiative (OSI), celebrates those who sustain Open Source projects, with a special focus on security this year. Throughout May, OSI will spotlight maintainers who prioritize secure development, share stories, and host a virtual Town Hall on May 21st to discuss best practices.

GoDaddy announced the launch of GoDaddy Agency: GoDaddy Agency, a new partner program designed to help digital agencies grow by connecting them with small and mid-sized business leads. Agencies can access GoDaddy’s tools, services, and support to build websites, manage digital marketing, and launch online stores. The program also offers commission opportunities, co-branded marketing, and expert guidance to agency partners.
A2 Hosting has been rebranded: A2 Hosting rebrands to Hosting.com, and this change reflects the company’s growth into a global leader while staying true to its roots of speed, reliability, and customer-first service.
The latest version of Convoworks GPT now includes MCP server support: Tole made the announcement on X and stated that this is the first true WordPress/PHP-based MCP server that requires no TypeScript.
AI Services version 0.6.0 released: This release adds multimodal output, letting you create both text and images using a single model. Other enhancements include PHP+JS code previews in the AI Playground, and updated support for Chrome’s built-in AI.
SpeedyCache reaches a milestone: The plugin has crossed 400K active installs.
Simple Cloudflare Turnstile has just reached 80,000+ active installs: Elliot Sowersby on X stated that the plugin is seeing around 5,000 new active installs per month.
All DE{CODE} sessions are available on demand: DE{CODE} 2025 brought together attendees from 114 countries across multiple time zones, who tuned in for 12 insightful sessions spanning 3 dedicated tracks. The sessions are available on YouTube.
Birgit Pauli-Haack started a Gutenberg Times Discord server: Those interested can join the space and connect.
Brian Gardner is no longer blocked by WordPress on X: Brian Gardner can once again follow the official WordPress handle, and the blocks, as Matt Mullenweg mentioned, have now started to be lifted.
Flexile is now MIT licensed: Flexile, a platform for onboarding and managing independent contractors to enterprise customers, has been made open source.
Harcy Joy Dela Cruz receives the Yoast Care fund for her contribution to the WordPress community: Harcy Joy Dela Cruz, a member of the WordPress community, is the latest recipient of the Yoast Care fund.

🚀 NEW PROJECTS

New ThemeSwitcher Pro plugin by WebDevStudios: The plugin allows users to run multiple themes on their WordPress website simultaneously, all based on customizable conditions. The first 100 customers will receive a 20% discount when they use the code SWITCHITUP at checkout.
MD Governance plugin by Multidots: The plugin allows administrators to control access and settings of Gutenberg blocks for different user roles.
Fetcher for Gravity Forms: This plugin, created by JetSloth, is a new command bar for Gravity Forms. It provides inline links to common admin pages and actions.
Introducing MailerPress by SEOPress: This is a new emailing plugin and is currently in active development. Interested folks can join the waitlist.

🔖 INTERESTING READS & PODCASTS

More posts and podcasts from the WordPress Community you don’t want to miss

Can AI help WordPress freelancers make more money?: Eric Karkovack explores how AI can help WordPress freelancers increase their earnings by improving productivity and efficiency. Tools like ChatGPT and GitHub’s CoPilot can automate time-consuming tasks, allowing freelancers to take on more projects and offer advanced features to clients. From The WP Minute.
Ryan Welcher on what’s new for developers: Nathan ad Ryan discussed the tecent updates to WordPress Core, including the Block Bindings API, Plugin Template Registration API, Preview Options API, and the new Data Views and more. From WP Tavern Jukebox.
Space, selfies, and STEM: Who really wins?: In this episode, Michelle and Samah discuss recent job changes, travels, and community events. They critically reflect on the Blue Origin spaceflight with an all-women crew, questioning its impact on women in STEM and tech, and whether space tourism truly inspires future women scientists.
Managing WordPress Code with GitLab: This session explains how GitLab provides repository management for WordPress sites while integrating with Pantheon. It also discussed repository management with GitLab’s issues and epics, collaboration workflows, and code reviews through Merge Requests, and automated CI/CD deployments across Pantheon’s dev, test, and live environments.
How can you manage multiple WordPress sites?: In this guide, Joe Fylan shows the ways to manage all your sites from one place, whether you’re running your own portfolio or looking after client projects. From WordPress.com.
WooCommerce Cron Jobs: What they do and why they matter?: The article explains what WP-Cron is, how WooCommerce depends on it, how you can monitor and manage WooCommerce cron jobs, and several techniques for adding custom cron jobs. From Pressable.

🛠 GUIDE ZONE – HOWTO’S and MORE

Handpicked fresh guides from WordPress circle

How to create a seamless scrolling marquee in WordPress using core Gutenberg blocks: From Jamie Marsland
How to create high-converting storybrand-style personalized landing pages using Omnisend, Bolt.new, and WordPress (Beginner’s Guide): From Jamie Marsland
ERR_NAME_NOT_RESOLVED: How to resolve the error that’s got you stuck: From WPMarmite
A quick guide to escaping PHP data in WordPress: From Speckyboy
How to design a blog like a pro (Even if you’re just getting started): From WordPress.com
Building a CSS carousel WordPress block: From Pascal Birchler
WordPress maintenance checklist: What to do (and when) to keep your site running smoothly: From Kinsta

📆 SAVE THE DATES

Do not miss a WordPress event ever again

WordCamp Lisboa 2025 on May 16-17, 2025: Tickets are now available.
WordCamp Europe on 5-7 June 2025: Tickets are now available.
WPCampus 2025 on July 23–25, 2025: The call for proposals is now open.
WordCamp US on August 26-29, 2025: The call for organizers is now open.
SomeConf 2025: The event is in the early planning stages. The call for sponsors and speakers is now live.
WordCamp Canada on October 16-17 2025: The call for sponsors is now open.
WordCamp Asia 2026: It is tentatively planned for early February 2026 and the call for organizers is now open.

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