[ Certified Ethical Hacker v10 ] :: [ Chapter 5 ] :: System Hacking

A hacker only needs to be right once.

ECC’s System Hacking Goals

Gaining Access

One of the most common ways to gain access to a system is by seeing, asking for, stealing or cracking a password.

See the next section, Hash Cracking, for examples and explanation.

Windows can be a juicy target because Windows domains pass the user’s hashed password around the network for authentication. This creates the “pass the hash” vulnerability.

Pass the Hash

Windows networks (some of them) pass user authentication around by passing the users’ hashed passwords around. (Can you say “What an effing terrible idea”?)

For examples of pass the hash in action, let me take this opportunity to introduce you to Ippsec, his Youtube channel and his highly valuable website.

Let’s hit the website first, and search for “pass the hash”:
https://ippsec.rocks

You will find two relevant examples, Ypuffy and Silo.

In the Ypuffy video, jump to 20:00
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoB-J-eDvrg&t=1290

In the Silo video, jump to 40:00
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2c7SzNo9uoA&t=2720

Exploit Toolkits for Fun and Profit

At least, some of these toolkits are profitable for their creators. The Blackhole Exploit Toolkit, for instance, will set you back $1500 a year:

https://thehackernews.com/2011/05/blackhole-exploit-kit-download.html

There are a TON of these to be found, but getting into theses is risky.

Creating Exploits with MSFvenom

Another way to gain access to a system is through a known exploit, which can be packaged up and delivered to the victim. See this good tutorial from the people at OffSec:

https://www.offensive-security.com/metasploit-unleashed/Msfvenom/

Rapid7’s How To:

https://github.com/rapid7/metasploit-framework/wiki/How-to-use-msfvenom

We recommend watching lots of videos to see how MSFvenom works:

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=msfvenom

Creating Shell Code with Shellter

“Shellter is a dynamic shellcode injection tool, and the first truly dynamic PE infector ever created.
It can be used in order to inject shellcode into native Windows applications (currently 32-bit applications only).
The shellcode can be something yours or something generated through a framework, such as Metasploit.”

https://www.shellterproject.com/introducing-shellter/
https://www.shellterproject.com/Downloads/Shellter/Readme.txt

Creating Payloads with Veil

Veil is a tool designed to generate metasploit payloads that bypass common anti-virus solutions.

https://github.com/Veil-Framework/Veil

Escalating Privileges

Executing Applications

Hiding Files

Maintaining Access

Infosec Institute has a great discussion:

https://resources.infosecinstitute.com/penetration-testing-maintaining-access/

One of the biggest reasons to maintain access is to perform data exfiltration. Actually, this could be done from inside or outside a victim system, using a variety of covert channels, for instance DNS:

DNS Data Exfiltration – How it works

Give it a try (with appropriate permissions or a contract, of course):

https://github.com/Arno0x/DNSExfiltrator

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