RE: Website search engine is a hacking tool..

["Mark Curphey" <mark () curphey com>]

We have an updated version we will release soon with full source code. As
well as minor bug fixing you will be able to choose the amount of results
returned and issue raw queries to the web service. Expect about another 6
weeks for release (no fixed dates yet).

-----Original Message-----
From: Charles Gillman [mailto:charles.gillman () ethertech com au] 
Sent: Friday, July 23, 2004 11:17 PM
To: Drew Copley; Gerry Eisenhaur; Amal Mohammad Al Hajeri
Cc: pen-test () securityfocus com
Subject: RE: Website search engine is a hacking tool..

The folks at Foundstone have already created a tool to do exactly as Amal
suggests using the Google API's.   It's called SiteDigger
http://www.foundstone.com/index.htm?subnav=resources/navigation.htm&subconte
nt=/resources/information_gathering_tools.htm

I have found it to be a bit buggy, returning results to an unrelated site
occasionally but that could also be the Google API's.

CG


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Drew Copley [mailto:dcopley () eEye com]
> Sent: Friday, 23 July 2004 8:01 AM
> To: Gerry Eisenhaur; Amal Mohammad Al Hajeri
> Cc: pen-test () securityfocus com
> Subject: RE: Website search engine is a hacking tool..
>
>
>
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Gerry Eisenhaur [mailto:GEisenhaur () cisco com]
> > Sent: Wednesday, July 21, 2004 12:54 PM
> > To: Amal Mohammad Al Hajeri
> > Cc: pen-test () securityfocus com
> > Subject: Re: Website search engine is a hacking tool..
> >
> > There have been many articles written about using google as a 
> > hacking tool. All you really though need is an imagination.
> >
> > Here are some google modifiers that you might not know of:
> > http://www.google.com/help/operators.html
> >
> > and here are some ideas to get you started:
> > http://johnny.ihackstuff.com/index.php?module=prodreviews
> >
> > You would be amazed at whats out there, I've found everything from 
> > VNC passwords for entire domains, WEP keys, to pictures of peoples 
> > family.
>
> Not sure how "pictures of people's family" is relevant.
>
> I have had to track back some people sometimes through the years, and 
> at least once found "pictures of their family".
>
> The most successful examples have been for tracking back entirely 
> "anonymous" people through their fingerprint of writing to their real 
> identities. Identidity in the plural, because often the only identity 
> online is multiple psuedo-anonymous ones that give real details in 
> various forums.
>
> In one example we thought a troll was a pedophile because he was found 
> trying to pick up fifteen year old girls. Turns out, surprise 
> surprise, he was fifteen. His terrified mom told us when we called her 
> up.
>
> In another case, a neo-nazi troll was caught because of his unusual 
> fascination with a certain vulgar phrase he had the unfortunate luck 
> to coin.
>
> This trace back gave his home address and the highly vulnerable 
> information that he actually kept gold bars under his baseboards.
>
> Being confronted with this information he promptly repented and never 
> returned.
>
> Their "fingerprint" is derived by breaking up their sentences and 
> finding specific phrases and misspellings. Then, these are put into 
> search engines and return counts and possible identities are put 
> against these. If lucky, one can whittle down the suspect list to some 
> positive proof. I am not aware of this method being used or documented 
> anywhere, though it works on basic forensic science principles used in 
> physical criminology and utilizes well known linguistic forensics...
>
> So that is a more unusual example of "google hacking" [sic]...
>
> While the methods I specified are useful for tracking back scum bags 
> they also could be used to find hackable targets in a weak link target 
> scenario.
>
> There are few corporate or governmental targets better then an 
> "executive" at home on his take home laptop. Search engines are 
> instrumental in finding that kind of identity. FYI.
>
>
> > --gerry
> >
> >
> > Amal Mohammad Al Hajeri wrote:
> > > Hi List,
> > >
> > > Did you ever thought of the website search engine as a hacking tool?
> > > During one of the pen-tests, The website search engine, was
> > a valuable
> > > tool to discover interesting directories within the website 
> > > itself, these directories were not detected by famous website 
> > > scanners like nikto or SPI dynamics,i managed to get documentation 
> > > pages
> > about the API
> > > application implemented, management login pages, backup
> > files and much
> > > more.
> > > I leave it to your imagination to search for words like:
> > > password,login,oracle,database,administrator, backup...etc
> > >
> > > Best Regards,
> > >
> > >
> > > -----------------------------------
> > > Amal M. Al-Hajeri
> > > E/Network & Information Security
> > > Etisalat
> >
> > --
> > Gerald Eisenhaur
> > Cisco Systems, Inc.
> > 1414 Massachusetts Ave.
> > Boxborough, MASSACHUSETTS 01719
> > tel:        978.936.0465
> > geisenhaur () cisco com