Rick Theeuwes

A hacker with a passion for development.

Skills

Here I will describe the skills I want to learn this semester, on both a technical and personel level. With these goals I will make a planning.

Technical skills

I want to learn about red teaming. I did my internship at a small pentesting company (HackDefense), and red teaming is what I want to do for the rest of my life. Since my specialastion I’ve had a keen interest for finding exploits and breaking in. Lastly, I like malware, both in creating and in reverseing. I know some basics, but I’d like to learn more.

Procedural skills

This semester I’d like to get better at reporting findings of a test. Following HackDefense’ vision, the report defines the results of a pentest and the useablity for the costumer. A bad report renders the test useless.

Attitude

This semester I’d like to get more than just a Proficient, so that requires some discipline I might lack. That’s why I will try to keep my plannig up to date as much as possible, so I can see where I stand and how much speed I need set on my exercises. I will ofcourse focus on the requiered work first. I also need to make sure that I update my portfolio after finishing an assinment, so it is always up to date.

Soft Skills

Main soft skills I need are documentation and feedback. I often forget or procrastinate these things, while they are the most important skills at Fontys.

Planning

Week Excersices Challenges  
1 M: Set up your personal toolbox environments for pen-testing and red teaming. M: Own one of the active Linux based machines in Hack the Box and create a write-up of it.  
2 S: Learn how to do reversing of smartphone apps (for android, iphone, …). S: Perform a vulnerability analysis on a (smartphone) app. Report your findings through responsible disclosure.  
3   M: Own one of the active Windows based machines in Hack the Box and create a write-up of it.  
4 C: Pick a lock. Study the security of physical locks and pick a lock with a lock picking set.    
5   M: Work on challenge(s) of your personal interest, some ideas are presented during the red-teaming kickoff.  
6 M: Experiment with phishing tooling in a controlled, separated environment (do not send phishing mails without a written consent!) C: Develop a dropbox that can be used in red teaming assignments  
7   M: Prepare towards a Red Team - Blue Team exercise (day/event)  
8   M: Set up and perform a pen-test on an (early version of a potentially shippable) product of one of the cyber security R&D project.  
9 M: Read about covert channels (see e.g. [8][9]), find applications of covert channels in hacking and red teaming, and set-up one or several experimental applications of covert channels    
10   C: Perform vulnerability analysis on websites from organizations that have a responsible disclosure disclosure policy. Report your findings through responsible disclosure.  
11 S: Complete challenges in all categories on different levels in Hack the Box.    
12   C: Perform a pen-test on an (early version of a potentially shippable) product of the security engineering students or blue teaming students.  
13 M: Find a couple of red teaming and pen-tester vacancies with job descriptions and analyse what task and skills are described. Add to and update your learning plan as needed.    
14 S: With a red teaming perspective visit a local building (school, library, store)    
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Exercises

Exercises that you can use to learn and train your red teaming knowledge and skills: Note: The exercises are labeled with MoSCoW (Links to an external site.) labels.

  1. M: Find a couple of red teaming and pen-tester vacancies with job descriptions and analyse what task and skills are described. Add to and update your learning plan as needed.

    I already am very active with looking for vacanies for mmy internship, so I just have to write this down.

  2. M: Experiment with phishing tooling in a controlled, separated environment (do not send phishing mails without a written consent!)

    I don’t know who to send these phishing-mail, if any. I do have a virtual Machine enviroment for local testing.

  3. M: Read about covert channels (see e.g. [8][9]), find applications of covert channels in hacking and red teaming, and set-up one or several experimental applications of covert channels.

    I have some old hardware laying around (laptop/raspberry) I can use to test this on, or maybe this will also work on my vm-enviroment, where I can place a IDS.

  4. M: Set up your personal toolbox environments for pen-testing and red teaming.

    This will also be done in my virtual enviroment.

  5. C: Pick a lock. Study the security of physical locks and pick a lock with a lock picking set.

    I have some lod and unused locks and a lockpicking set.

  6. S: Learn how to do reversing of smartphone apps (for android, iphone, …).

    On my local Kali VM I can look into my own and others app.

  7. S: Complete challenges in all categories on different levels in Hack the Box.

    This will mostly be done om my Kali machine.

  8. -S: With a red teaming perspective visit a local building (school, library, store), document your observations AFTERWARDS from a security point of view (people, processes, technology) also reflect on your experience. Act PASSIVELY, don’t do anything illegal or anything that could lead to suspicion or inconvenience: do not make notes or photos, visit rooms you are not supposed to, try fire doors, etc.

    I might be able to come to my mother’s workplace, where I can sit down and check all of the physical security.

Challenges

Challenges that you can use to become a better red teaming security specialist: Note: The exercises are labeled with MoSCoW (Links to an external site.) labels.

  1. -M: Own one of the active Linux based machines in Hack the Box and create a write-up of it.

    This can be done with the VPN-environment of Hack The Box and my own virtual environment.

  2. -M: Own one of the active Windows based machines in Hack the Box and create a write-up of it.

    This can be done with the VPN-environment of Hack The Box and my own virtual environment.

  3. -M: Set up and perform a pen-test on an (early version of a potentially shippable) product of one of the cyber security R&D project.

  4. -M: Prepare towards a Red Team - Blue Team exercise (day/event) with the Security Engineering students and the Blue Team students to attack and test the IT systems and applications developed by the Security Engineering students and the Blue teaming Capabilities of the Blue Teaming students. Test your red teaming skills, procedures and red team toolbox and environment. Use the experience of the first event to improve your Red Teaming systems, toolbox, skills, and procedures.

  5. -M: Work on challenge(s) of your personal interest, some ideas are presented during the red-teaming kickoff.

  6. -S: Perform a vulnerability analysis on a (smartphone) app. Report your findings through responsible disclosure.

  7. -C: Perform vulnerability analysis on websites from organizations that have a responsible disclosure disclosure policy. Report your findings through responsible disclosure.

  8. -C: Perform a pen-test on an (early version of a potentially shippable) product of the security engineering students or blue teaming students.

  9. -C: Develop a dropbox that can be used in red teaming assignments.

  10. S: Perform vulnerability analysis on a device (hardware/consumer products). Report your findings through responsible disclosure.

  11. S: Look into the security of IoT or OT (e.g. PLC) protocols and technology and find and replay one or more hacks or other security incidents in a test environment.

  12. C: Define and publish a pen-testing service for FHICT PII projects that are running in other FHICT minors. See for example service descriptions [2], [3], [4]. Communicate the existence of the service to other programs, projects, PII’s. The goal then of course is to set up and perform a pen-test on an iteration product of one of the (other) FHICT PII projects.

Alternative options

Other options that you can use to learn more about red teaming are: The exercises are labeled with MoSCoW (Links to an external site.) labels.

  1. C: Get Red Teaming assignments, pen-tests, vulnerability research from partners in education, partners in innovation, other project groups, your personal network.

  2. S: Visit (online, due to COVID-19) seminars or conferences related to red teaming, hacking, relevant tools, etc.

  3. C: Organize and set-up an (online) interview with a red teaming specialist.

  4. S: Organize or join a session to analyze a new vulnerability, exploit or malware with a group of red and blue teamers, and other people that are interested.

  5. S: Join CTF-events with a couple of other red teaming students, see https://ctftime.org.

  6. S: Setup a wiki/website/… where students can share interesting resources related to red teaming.

  7. C: Contribute to the INTERSECT (Links to an external site.) research by demonstrating known or new attack scenario’s in ‘Smart Energy’ applications, for example in electric vehicle charging networks end endpoints/apps/…, smart energy home applications and energy systems, etc. Note: You could then also use this as a base for the article that you will write and publish at the end of the semester.

My own projects

  1. Describe a new and or current exploit and use it.

  2. Hacking with bad-USB and WHID

  3. Hack the box Fortress