@pown/recon

Recon

Recon is a target reconnaissance framework powered by knowledge graphs. Using knowledge graphs instead of flat table representation is easier to find the relationships between different types of information, which comes quite handy in many situations. Knowledge graphs algorithms also help with diffing, searching, finding the shortest path, and many other helpful tasks to aid information discovery and intelligence gathering.

Scripting

Pown recon is designed to be scripted either via your favorite shell environment, Pown Script, Pown Engine Templates and JavaScript. Scripts benefit from preserved context between each command execution. This means that you can build a graph without the need to save and restore into intermediate files.

Pown Script

Pown Script is a simple scripting language similar to bash. It is designed to run a sequence of pown commands while preserving memory context for faster execution.

Using your favourite editor create a file called example.pown with the following contents:

echo This is script

recon add --node-type brand target

recon t auto

Execute the script from pown:

$ pown script path/to/example.pown

Pown Recon Exec

Pown Recon can execut JavaScript files directly via its command line. This gives you the ability to programatically interface with the engine which is a very powerful way to orchestrate complex setup.

Using your favourite editor create a file called example.js with the following contents:

module.exports = async (recon, { shq }) => {
   // directly interface with the script using shq

   const target = 'target.com'

   await shq`recon add --node-type domain ${target}`

   // if this is not enough you can interface with recon engine programatically

   recon.addNode({
      type: 'domain,
      label: target
   })
}

Here is an example of scripted workflow we use at secapps.com:

module.exports = async ({ shq }) => {
  // print everything that we do

  await shq`set -x`

  // add remotes to the engine

  for (const remote of process.env.RECON_REMOTES.split(/\s+/g)) {
    await shq`recon remote add ${remote}`
  }

  // setup useful tranversal functions we will use later

  await shq`recon v set 'target_urls' 'filter node[id="group:Targets"] > node[type="uri"],node[type="url"]'`
  await shq`recon v set 'target_domain_urls' 'filter node[id="group:Targets"] > node[type="domain"] | neighborhood node[type="uri"],node[type="url"]'`
  await shq`recon v set 'target_domain_subodmain_urls' 'filter node[id="group:Targets"] > node[type="domain"] | neighborhood edge[type="subdomain"] | connectedNodes node[type="domain"] | neighborhood node[type="uri"],node[type="url"]'`
  await shq`recon v set 'all_possible_urls' 'traverseByName target_urls & traverseByName target_domain_urls & traverseByName target_domain_subodmain_urls'`

  // add all url targets

  for (const url of process.env.TARGET_URLS.split(/\s+/g)) {
    await shq`recon add --node-type 'uri' ${url}`
  }

  // add all domain targets

  for (const domain of process.env.TARGET_DOMAINS.split(/\s+/g)) {
    await shq`recon add --node-type 'domain' ${domain}`
  }

  // group target as Targets so that we can find them easily

  await shq`recon group Targets 'node[type="uri"],node[type="domain"]'`

  // setup a list of tasks we will run in order

  const tasks = [
    async () => {
      // run the cohesion scanner on all targets

      await shq`recon t -C 1 cohesion_scanner -v 'filter node[id="group:Targets"] > node[type="uri"],node[type="url"]'`
    },

    async () => {
      // do some automatic transformations on all nodes connected to targets

      await shq`recon t auto -v 'filter node[id="group:Targets"] > node'`
    },

    async () => {
      // construct urls

      await shq`recon t build_uri --protocol 'http' -v 'filter node[type="domain"]'`
      await shq`recon t build_uri --protocol 'https' -v 'filter node[type="domain"]'`
    },

    async () => {
      // probe the research cluster (internal system) for any knowledge about target domains

      await shq`recon t research --type 'uri' -v 'filter node[id="group:Targets"] > node[type="domain"]'`
    },

    async () => {
      // run the cohesion analyser

      await shq`recon t -C 500 cohesion_analyser --analyse-scripts -v 'traverseByName all_possible_urls'`
    },

    async () => {
      // run the cohesion finder

      await shq`recon t -C 100 cohesion_finder -v 'traverseByName all_possible_urls'`
    },

    async () => {
      // assign vulndb entries for all issues

      await shq`recon t -C 100 local_vulndb -s 'node[type="issue"]'`
    },

    async () => {
      // group all issues as Issues

      await shq`recon g 'Issues' 'node[type="issue"],node[type="web:vuln:issue"],node[type="web:vuln:variant"]'`
    },

    async () => {
      // sumarise everything

      await shq`runner store --summary-kind 'type' --summary-select 'node[type="domain"],node[type="uri"],node[type="url"]'`
    },
  ]

  // run the tasks in order

  for (const [index, task] of tasks.entries()) {
    // update the state

    await shq`runner state -s ${index} -S ${tasks.length} -m '' --summarize`

    // print the mem so that we know how well we are doing before running the task

    await shq`mem`

    // run the task

    await task()

    // checkout the mem again

    await shq`mem`
  }
}

Scripting Examples

For more information, see the ./examples for more ideas how to use scripts.

Selectors

Some commands expect graph selectors. The rest of the documentation is copy of cytoscape.js selectors manual with some minor differences.

A selector functions similar to a CSS selector on DOM elements, but selectors in Recon instead work on collections of graph elements. This mechanism is provided by the powerful cytoscape.js.

The selectors can be combined together to make powerful queries, for example:

pown select 'node[weight >= 50][height < 180]'

Selectors can be joined together (effectively creating a logical OR) with commas:

pown select 'node#j, edge[source = "j"]'

It is important to note that strings need to be enclosed by quotation marks:

pown select 'node[type = "domain"]'

Note that metacharacters ( ^ $ \ / ( ) | ? + * [ ] { } , . ) need to be escaped:

pown select '#some\$funky\@id'

Group, class, & ID

• node, edge, or * (group selector) Matches elements based on group (node for nodes, edge for edges, * for all).
• .className Matches elements that have the specified class (e.g. use .foo for a class named "foo").
• The #id Matches element with the matching ID (e.g. #foo is the same as [id = 'foo'])

Data

• [name] Matches elements if they have the specified data attribute defined, i.e. not undefined (e.g. [foo] for an attribute named “foo”). Here, null is considered a defined value.
• [^name] Matches elements if the specified data attribute is not defined, i.e. undefined (e.g [^foo]). Here, null is considered a defined value.
• [?name] Matches elements if the specified data attribute is a truthy value (e.g. [?foo]).
• [!name] Matches elements if the specified data attribute is a falsey value (e.g. [!foo]).
• [name = value] Matches elements if their data attribute matches a specified value (e.g. [foo = 'bar'] or [num = 2]).
• [name != value] Matches elements if their data attribute doesn’t match a specified value (e.g. [foo != 'bar'] or [num != 2]).
• [name > value] Matches elements if their data attribute is greater than a specified value (e.g. [foo > 'bar'] or [num > 2]).
• [name >= value] Matches elements if their data attribute is greater than or equal to a specified value (e.g. [foo >= 'bar'] or [num >= 2]).
• [name < value] Matches elements if their data attribute is less than a specified value (e.g. [foo < 'bar'] or [num < 2]).
• [name <= value] Matches elements if their data attribute is less than or equal to a specified value (e.g. [foo <= 'bar'] or [num <= 2]).
• [name *= value] Matches elements if their data attribute contains the specified value as a substring (e.g. [foo *= 'bar']).
• [name ^= value] Matches elements if their data attribute starts with the specified value (e.g. [foo ^= 'bar']).
• [name $= value] Matches elements if their data attribute ends with the specified value (e.g. [foo $= 'bar']).
• @ (data attribute operator modifier) Prepended to an operator so that is case insensitive (e.g. [foo @$= 'ar'], [foo @>= 'a'], [foo @= 'bar'])
• ! (data attribute operator modifier) Prepended to an operator so that it is negated (e.g. [foo !$= 'ar'], [foo !>= 'a'])
• [[]] (metadata brackets) Use double square brackets in place of square ones to match against metadata instead of data (e.g. [[degree > 2]] matches elements of degree greater than 2). The properties that are supported include degree, indegree, and outdegree.

Compound nodes

• > (child selector) Matches direct children of the parent node (e.g. node > node).
• (descendant selector) Matches descendants of the parent node (e.g. node node).
• $ (subject selector) Sets the subject of the selector (e.g. $node > node to select the parent nodes instead of the children).

Traversals

A complex type of selection is known as traversal.

Transforms

Here are some of the transforms available in Recon. Additional transforms are available in optional pown modules.

• GitHub Search of Repos, Gists and Members (via @pown/github)
• Bitbucket Search of Repos, Snippets and Members
• CloudFlare 1.1.1.1 DNS API
• CRTSH (CN & SAN)
• DockerHub Repo Search
• Gravatar URLs
• Hacker Target Reverse IP Lookup
• PKS Lookup
• Bufferover.run
• Urlscan
• Threatcrowd
• Wappalyzer
• Riddler
• Shodan
• WhoAreThey(via @pown/whoarethey)
• Certspotter
• Virustotal
• Security Trails
• Utility Transforms
• Auto Recon

Tutorial

To demonstrate the power of Recon and graph-based OSINT (Open Source Intelligence), let's have a look at the following trivial example.

Let's start by querying everyone who is a member of Google's engineering team and contributes to their GitHub account.

pown recon t -w google.network ghlm google

This command will generate a table similar to this:

   github:member
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ uri                                                     │ login                                                   │ avatar                                                  │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ https://github.com/3rf                                  │ 3rf                                                     │ https://avatars1.githubusercontent.com/u/1242478?v=4    │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ https://github.com/aaroey                               │ aaroey                                                  │ https://avatars0.githubusercontent.com/u/31743510?v=4   │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ https://github.com/aarongable                           │ aarongable                                              │ https://avatars3.githubusercontent.com/u/2474926?v=4    │
...
...
...
│ https://github.com/alexpennace                          │ alexpennace                                             │ https://avatars1.githubusercontent.com/u/2506548?v=4    │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ https://github.com/alexv                                │ alexv                                                   │ https://avatars0.githubusercontent.com/u/30807372?v=4   │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ https://github.com/alexwhouse                           │ alexwhouse                                              │ https://avatars3.githubusercontent.com/u/1448490?v=4    │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

You just created your first network!

The representation is tabular for convenience but underneath we've got a model which consists of nodes connected by edges.

If you are wondering what that looks like you can use SecApps Recon. The command line does not have the necessary level of interactivity to present the complexity of graphs.

The -w google.network command line option exported the network to a file. You can load the file directly into SecApps Recon with the file open feature. The result will look like this:

Now imagine that we want to query what repositories these Google engineers are working on. This is easy. First, we need to select the nodes in the graph and then transform them with the "GitHub List Repositories" transformation. This is how we do it from the command line:

pown recon t ghlr -r google.network -w google2.nework -s 'node[type="github:member"]'

If you don't hit GitHub API rate limits, you will be presented with this:

   github:repo
┌──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┬──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ uri                                                                                  │ fullName                                                                             │
├──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ https://github.com/3rf/2015-talks                                                    │ 3rf/2015-talks                                                                       │
├──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ https://github.com/3rf/codecoroner                                                   │ 3rf/codecoroner                                                                      │
├──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ https://github.com/3rf/DefinitelyTyped                                               │ 3rf/DefinitelyTyped                                                                  │
...
...
...
│ https://github.com/agau4779/ultimate-tic-tac-toe                                     │ agau4779/ultimate-tic-tac-toe                                                        │
├──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ https://github.com/agau4779/worm_scraper                                             │ agau4779/worm_scraper                                                                │
├──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┼──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ https://github.com/agau4779/zsearch                                                  │ agau4779/zsearch                                                                     │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┴──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Since now we have two files google.network and google2.network you might be wondering what is the difference between them. Well, we have a tool for doing just that.

pown recon diff google.network google2.network

Now we know! This feature is quite useful if you are building large recon maps and you would like to know what are the key differences. Imagine your cron job performs the same recon every day and you would like to know if something new just appeared which might be worth exploring further. Hello, bug bounty hunters!