1. Web Security Academy
  2. JWT attacks
  3. Lab

Lab: JWT authentication bypass via weak signing key

PRACTITIONER

This lab uses a JWT-based mechanism for handling sessions. It uses an extremely weak secret key to both sign and verify tokens. This can be easily brute-forced using a wordlist of common secrets.

To solve the lab, first brute-force the website's secret key. Once you've obtained this, use it to sign a modified session token that gives you access to the admin panel at /admin, then delete the user carlos.

You can log in to your own account using the following credentials: wiener:peter

Tip

We recommend familiarizing yourself with how to work with JWTs in Burp Suite before attempting this lab.

We also recommend using hashcat to brute-force the secret key. For details on how to do this, see Brute forcing secret keys using hashcat.

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