This vulnerability arise when you give any input to the host parameter and it may reflect back .
Impact
An attacker can use the vulnerability to
construct a request that, if issued by another application user, will
cause JavaScript code supplied by the attacker to execute within the
user's browser in the context of that user's session with the
application.
Real World Example:
Path : /billing-admin/profile/subscription/?l=de
Payload : c5obc'+alert(1)+'p7yd5
Steps to reproduce :
Request Header :
GET /billing-admin/profile/subscription/?l=de HTTP/1.1
Host: www.semrush.com
Accept: /
Accept-Language: en
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; MSIE 9.0; Windows NT 6.1; Win64; x64; Trident/5.0)
Connection: close
Referer: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=c5obc'+alert(1)+'p7yd5
Overview :
The payload c5obc'+alert(1)+'p7yd5 was submitted in the Referer HTTP
header. Payload is copied from a request and echoed into the
application's immediate response in an unsafe way.
In the above example the payload reflect back in the response causing the rise of the vulnerability.
This vulnerability raised when a website uses the Host header when sending out password
reset links. This allows an attacker to insert a malicious host header,
leading to password reset link / token leakage.
Developers often
resort to the exceedingly untrustworthy HTTP Host header (_SERVER["HTTP_HOST"] in PHP or in another languages
There are two main ways to exploit this trust in regular web applications.
The first approach is web-cache poisoning;
manipulating caching systems into storing a page generated with a
malicious Host and serving it to others.
The second technique abuses
alternative channels like password reset emails where the poisoned
content is delivered directly to the target.
Impact
The victim will receive the malicious link in their email, and, when
clicked, will leak the user's password reset link / token to the
attacker, leading to full account takeover.
Example for more understanding
1.) Open up Firefox and Burp Suite.)
2.) Visit the forgot password page (/index.php/login/concrete/forgot_password)
3.) Enter the victim's email address and click Reset and Email Password
4.) Intercept the HTTP request in Burp Suite & change the Host Header to your malicious site / server.
5.) Forward the request and you'll be redirected to your server.
The victim will then receive a password reset e-mail with your poisoned link.
If the victim clicks the link, the reset token will be leaked and the
attacker will be able to find the reset token in the server logs. The
attacker can then browse to the reset page with the token and change the
password of the victim account!
Remediation
Use $_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'] rather than $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST']
Rewriting of links and URLs in cached pages to arbitrary strings by unauthenticated HTTP clients.When the application reflects HTTP Header value back in it's response and it may be possible to poison the server cache. The X-Forwarded-Host is directly reflected as a hyperlink. Than Host Header Attack - Cache Poisoning vulnerability may be there like:
Affected software: ANY site that does not validate HTTP Host: headers.
It is common practice for web programmers and web frameworks to rely on
the value of the HTTP Host header to write links. This is for
convenience, so that the same software will run on localhost, various
testing servers, subdomains, secondary domains, etc, without
modification. For example:
This turns out to be a very, very bad idea in any language.
The HTTP Host header is arbitrary text controlled by the client, but
common practice treats it as though it were a safe environment variable.
HTTP Request
GET / HTTP/1.1
Host: davindertutorials.com
X-Forwarded-Host: test.com
...
....
HTTP Response
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
....
....
....
<li class="SL_hide" title="Get New Relic on your iPad, iPhone, or
Android phone"><a href="http://test.com/mobility">New Relic
for iOS & Android</a></li>
....
Now as you see we are able to see test.com in the response.
Mitigation: DO NOT use the value
of the Host header for anything. If you must, apply very strict filters
to only allow valid FQDNs, and then whitelist the FQDNs you allow.
Treat it as you would any arbitrary data coming from the outside. If
your webserver is configured to output the value of the Host header (as
in the example, and as by default in many webservers), disable that
configuration.
In simple terms if a website x.com is requested and when i change the host to y.com , if I am able to open the host . Than it is a host header attack.
Vulnerability Description:
Open Redirection is sometimes used as a part of phishing attacks that confuse visitors about which web site they are visiting.
How to find this Vulnerability
1. Change host to x.com, Than click on go . If not able to success . than try below method.
2. Change host to x.com and Set X-Forwarded-Host to original domain.com, if still unable to get success , try the below one
3. Do the opposite to step two , Means change host to original domain.com and Set X-Forwarded-Host to original x.com
If you are unable to find success with the above written steps , Than may be the website is secured for this vulnerability.
Remediation:
If possible, the application should avoid incorporating
user-controllable data into redirection targets. In many cases, this
behavior can be avoided in two ways:
Remove the redirection function from the application, and replace links to it with direct links to the relevant target URLs.
Maintain a server-side list of all URLs that are permitted for
redirection. Instead of passing the target URL as a parameter to the
redirector, pass an index into this list.
Example of a Bug Reported:
Vulnerable URL: https://wakatime.com/settings/account?apikeyrefresh=true
Payload: " X-Forwarded-Host: bing.com "
How to reproduce this vulnerability:
An SPF record is a type of Domain Name Service (DNS) record that identifies which mail servers are permitted to send email on behalf of your domain. The purpose of an SPF record is to prevent spammers from sending messages with forged From addresses at your domain.
like : Suppose woodland company have email address as : customersupport@woodland.com , So if I am able to send a mail using that address that means SPF records are not properly set .
Checking Missing SPF:
There Are Various Ways of Checking Missing SPF Records on a website But the Most Common and Popular way is kitterman.com
Enter Target Website Ex: target.com (Do Not Add https/http or www) Hit Check SPF (IF ANY)
If You see any SPF Record than Domain is Not Vulnerable But if you see Nothing Here then "HURRAY! You Found a Bug"
POC:
Once There is No SPF Records. An Attacker Can Spoof Email Via any Fake Mailer Like Emkei.cz. An Attacker Can Send Email From name "Support" and Email: "support@davindertutorials.com" .With Social Engineering Attack He Can TakeOver User Account Let Victim Knows the Phishing Attack but When He See The Email from the Authorized Domain. He Got tricked Easily.
Confidentiality, integrity, and availability, often known as CIA, are the building blocks of information security .
Any attack on an information system will compromise one, two, or all three of these components. Based on which of these components is being compromised the most, efficient security controls can be designed accordingly.
Confidentiality
In layman’s terms, something that is confidential is secret and is not supposed to be disclosed to unintended people or entities. What’s the first thing that comes to your mind that needs to be kept confidential? Probably your passwords and ATM PINs . There may be many parameters and information items that need to be kept confidential during a particular communication. If confidentiality is compromised, it might result in unauthorized access to your systems or severe loss to your privacy!
Integrity
In context of the information security (InfoSec) world, integrity means that when a sender sends data, the receiver must receive exactly the same data as sent by the sender. For example, if someone sends a message “Hello!”, then the receiver must receive “Hello!” . Any addition or subtraction of data during transit would mean the integrity has been compromised.
Availability
Availability implies that information is available to the authorized parties whenever required. For example, consider a server that stores the payroll data of company employees. The finance team wants to access it at of fiscal year-end for some reporting purpose. If the server is able to provide all the requested information to the requestors, then its availability is considered good and healthy. But if the server goes down at all (for any intentional or unintentional reason), and the finance team is not able to retrieve required data in time, then we say that the information availability has been affected or compromised.
During an attack on a computer system, at least one of the three, confidentiality, integrity or availability, is affected or compromised.
Various attacks on Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability
Pentesting means finding vulnerabilities by using various techniques and methods .
Organisations hire consultants who have team of complete auditors who perfrom the pentesting .
Auditors are those who know how to find vulnerabilities and perform exploits as well to check the securities issues .
Auditors perform the task depending upon the agreement signed between the organisation and the auditors .
Based on the agreement , Pentesting will be performed. Just like we have different type of hackings like ... black ,white and grey box .. similarly auditors perform pentesting based on the the rights provided to them.
Types of hacking
External pentesting This type of hacking is done from the Internet against the client’s public network infrastructure; that is, on those computers in the organization that are exposed to the Internet because they provide a public service. Example of public hosts: router, firewall, web server, mail server, name server, etc.
Internal pentesting As the name suggests, this type of hacking is executed from the customer’s internal network.
Black box hacking This mode is applicable to external testing only. It is called so because the client only gives the name of the company to the consultant, so the auditor starts with no information.
Gray box hacking This method is often refer to internal pentestings. Nevertheless, some auditors also called gray-box-hacking an external test in which the client provides limited information on public computers to be audited.
White box hacking White-box hacking is also called transparent hacking. This method applies only to internal pentestings and is called this way because the client gives complete information to the auditor about its networks and systems.
Phases of hacking
Both the auditor and the cracker follow a logical sequence of steps when conducting a hacking. These grouped steps are called phases. There is a general consensus among the entities and information security professionals that these phases are 5 in the following order: 1-> Reconnaissance 2-> Scanning 3-> Gaining Access 4-> Maintaining Access 5-> Erasing Clues Usually these phases are represented as a cycle that is commonly called “the circle of hacking” with the aim of emphasizing that the cracker can continue the process over and over again.
Though, information security auditors who perform ethical hacking services present a slight variation in the implementation phases like this: