Understanding and Exploiting SMTP: A Pentester’s Guide Category: Exploiting ServicesAuthor: Offensive Cyber ProfessionalFocus: Enumeration → Exploitation → Post-Exploitation Overview: What is SMTP? SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) is the protocol used to send emails across networks. It operates over TCP port 25 (and sometimes 587 or 465 for submission and encrypted channels). While it’s essential […]
Exploiting Content Management Systems (CMS): Content Management Systems (CMSs) run a massive chunk of the modern web. WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, and others power everything from small blogs to enterprise intranets — and wherever people publish content, pentesters find opportunity. In this guide, we’ll walk through what CMSs are, how to identify and enumerate them, and
Port 135: The RPC Goldmine for Pentesters In many internal pentests, port 135 (MSRPC) is quietly open — sitting there like an unassuming door. But to those who understand it, that door leads to the inner workings of Windows systems. This post walks you through how to identify, enumerate, exploit, and abuse everything behind port
Exploiting WinRM: A Guide for Pentesters Table of Contents 1. What is WinRM? Windows Remote Management (WinRM) is Microsoft’s implementation of the WS-Management protocol — a SOAP-based protocol used for remote management. It’s commonly used to run PowerShell commands or scripts remotely, making it a prime target for lateral movement. Think of it like SSH
FTP over TLS (FTPS): Pentesting Encrypted File Transfers FTP over TLS, aka FTPS, upgrades classic FTP by adding encryption with TLS/SSL. While it’s more secure than plain FTP, it’s not invincible. Misconfigurations, weak certificates, or fallback to plain FTP can open attack doors. Let’s walk through the pentesting lifecycle on FTPS: scanning, enumeration, exploitation, and
Cracking HTTP Authentication: When people think of authentication, they think login pages. But some services tuck away a gatekeeper at the protocol level—HTTP Authentication. Whether it’s Basic, Digest, or Bearer, understanding how these mechanisms work helps pentesters bypass them, crack them, or abuse them. Here’s everything you need, step-by-step. 1. What is HTTP Authentication? HTTP
Sniffing Secrets with SNMP: The Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) was never designed with security in mind. It was meant to monitor and manage network devices—printers, switches, routers, servers—not to keep secrets. But guess what? It often does store secrets… and sometimes, hands them to you like candy. In this post, we’ll cover SNMP from
Breaking into MySQL: MySQL is one of the most popular relational databases in the world—and often overlooked as a foothold during penetration tests. With poor configurations, weak credentials, and overly permissive access, MySQL can go from backend database to full system compromise. Let’s walk through how to discover, enumerate, exploit, and post-exploit MySQL like a
Own the Shell: A Pentester’s Guide to Exploiting SSH SSH (Secure Shell) is a staple for remote administration in Linux and *nix systems—but for pentesters, it’s a door that can be kicked in, picked open, or snuck through with the right tools and intel. In this post, we’ll go through how to identify, enumerate, and
Cracking RDP: Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) is a go-to service for system administrators—and a juicy target for attackers. RDP provides GUI access to a remote Windows system, but misconfigurations, weak credentials, and unpatched systems make it a serious security risk. This guide walks through discovering, enumerating, exploiting, and abusing RDP like a pro. 1. What
