Conventional wisdom holds that the most vulnerable component of any computer system is its user. Humans may be inattentive, unthoughtful, or misinformed and easily become victims of phishing attacks. Accordingly, this weak link must be tested for…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Disassembling REvil. The notorious ransomware hides WinAPI calls
Some unknown hackers have recently attacked Travelex foreign exchange company using REvil ransomware. This trojan employs simple but efficient obfuscation techniques that conceal its WinAPI calls from the victim. Let's see how the encoder works.
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Diabolically reddish pentest. Building tunneling chains through docker containers on…
How to seize control over a host located in a different subnetwork? The right answer is: build numerous intricate tunnels. This article addresses tunneling techniques and their application in pentesting using as an example Reddish, a hardcore…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Hack the web! Checking web sites for vulnerabilities and exploiting…
Hacking web sites is one of the most common attack types. This article is dedicated to such attacks and protection against them. I will address the pentesting basics for web applications and explain how to deal with…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
DDoS attacks on Bluetooth. How to disable annoying portable speakers
Gangs of teenagers with portable Bluetooth speakers playing loud music drive me nuts. Today, I will explain how to neutralize this 'natural disaster' without (OK, almost without) committing a criminal offense.
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Solar stroke. Two severe vulnerabilities in Apache Solr
Not long ago, researchers have discovered two severe vulnerabilities in Apache Solr, a popular open-source full-text search platform. The first bug relates to incorrect handling of Velocity templates, while the second one originates from the DataImportHandler module.…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Over-the-air tricks. Simple and effective Wi-Fi pentesting techniques
In this article, I will demonstrate a few simple and common -although efficient! - Wi-Fi pentesting tricks: hiding your MAC address when you scan a network and attack WPA2, identification of 'hidden' networks, bypassing MAC filtering, and…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Attacking Active Directory. An overview of actual privilege escalation techniques
Compromising a domain controller involves more than just finding a known vulnerability, stealing user credentials, or identifying an error in the security policy settings. The above 'achievements' grant only the minimum access level that may be insufficient…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Lateral movement in Active Directory. Offensive techniques used to attack…
Imagine that you have successfully retrieved users' accounts in a network with an Active Directory domain controller and escalated your privileges. But what if you control not the entire network, but just a small segment of it?…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Hacker’s toolbox 2020. Pentesting devices you should have at hand
HackMag selected fifteen devices enabling you to pentest everything: from mechanisms to contactless cards. This list does not include trivial tools, like screwdrivers and soldering irons, because everybody chooses them individually. Hopefully, this toolkit would be useful…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Cyberdolphin. The story of Flipper — hacker’s Swiss Army knife
Hacking and pentesting are normally associated with hours-long sitting at your computer, but this is not quite so: many devices and wireless networks can be accessed only personally. In such situations, you need a hacking multitool -…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Wi-Fi total PWN. Mastering actual Wi-Fi pentesting techniques from scratch
The best way to check the network's security is by trying to hack it. In the past, HackMag had published materials about auditing Wi-Fi networks. Unfortunately, such guides quickly become obsolete. Today, I will share some practical…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Bug hunt. Spying devices and how to detect them
One might think that bugs from spy movies got obsolete nowadays. Who needs this stuff if microphones and cameras are everywhere - in laptops, smartphones, and zillions of other devices? However, in most cases, it is more…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
The beginning of Nginx. Igor Sysoev tells the story of…
On December 12, 2019, a surprise search was conducted in the Moscow office of Nginx, Inc. Igor Ippolitov, an engineer at Nginx, was the first to inform the public of it in his Twitter. The original tweet…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
The great mischief. Working your way to the root flag…
In this article, I will explain how to gain superuser privileges on Mischief VM available on [Hack The Box](https://www.hackthebox.eu/) training grounds. During this journey, you will acquire some SNMP skills, understand the IPv6 routing principles, and learn…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Secrets of the treasurer’s laptop: digital forensic analysis helps solve…
"Where's the money?" Or, rather, "Where did the money go?" The user of a company-owned Windows 10 laptop fell victim of a cyberfraud attack. Or maybe the employee faked it and stole the money while pointing fingers…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
No tracking, no bookmarks. How to assemble your own cellphone
What does your phone know about you? How secure is your information, and who can access it? Do you know that you can build and flash your own, 100% secure cellphone in just a few days? Today,…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Universal interception. How to bypass SSL Pinning and monitor traffic…
In many cases, the research of an app's internal structure can be narrowed down to monitoring its traffic. Just a few years ago, a major share of the traffic was transmitted via the plain, easily interceptable HTTP…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Protecting microcontrollers. Implementing Firmware Hardening and Secure Boot on STM32
The intensity of attacks targeting IoT devices increases with year over year. New threats require a complex approach; as a result, security became the top priority for both software developers and hardware manufacturers. This article addresses the…
CONTINUE READING 🡒 
Where to study pentesting? An overview of training grounds for…
Today, I will give a brief overview of some of the best pentesting portals recognized by security experts. These training grounds enable ethical hackers to polish their skills while preserving 'ethicality' and exploit newly-discovered vulnerabilities while staying…
CONTINUE READING 🡒