Nov 08 2022

Researchers Found Website Scanner “Urlscan.io” Leaking Sensitive Private Data

Category: Web SecurityDISC @ 11:50 am

Researchers from Positive Security uncovered a website scanner called “Urlscan” that unintentionally leaking sensitive URLs and data due to misconfiguration.

It appears that a third party accidentally leaked the GitHub Pages URLs, and this incident happened while a metadata analysis was being conducted.

“This information could be used by spammers to collect email addresses and other personal information,” Bräunlein, Co Founder Positive security said. “It could be used by cyber criminals to take over accounts and run believable phishing campaigns.”

The URLscan.io service is described as a sandbox for the web and has been referred to as a web scanner. Several security solutions integrate with its API in order to make their solutions more secure and feature-rich.

The idea behind it is to allow users to identify possible malicious websites with ease and confidence using a simple, straightforward tool. A wide range of open-source projects and enterprise customers are supported by the engine.

Sensitive data can be mined

It was discovered that users who enabled Github Pages as a hosting method for a private repository leaked the name of the repository. There does not seem to have been any public official acknowledgment of this breach as of yet.

There is a possibility that an anonymous user could easily search for and retrieve a vast amount and variety of sensitive data within the API integration. 

This is because the API is equipped with several varieties of security tools that run scans on incoming emails and conduct Urlscans on every link that is received.

Several types of information are provided with each scan result that is returned by the service, including:-

  • Password reset links
  • Unsubscribe links
  • Account creation URLs
  • API keys
  • Information about Telegram bots
  • DocuSign signing requests
  • Amazon gift delivery links
  • Shared Google Drive links
  • Dropbox file transfers
  • Invite links to SharePoint
  • Invite links to Discord
  • Government Zoom invites
  • PayPal invoices
  • Paypal money claim requests
  • Links to Cisco Webex meeting recordings
  • Package tracking links

It has been noted that some API integrations use generic Python requests that use the python-requests/2.X.Y module. This would lead to scans being mistakenly submitted as public if user agents ignored account visibility settings.

Integrations

A list of 26 commercial security solutions have integrated urlscan.io’s API and the security solutions include are:-

Tags: Website Scanner