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Secret in the URL

Apprentice 10 pts

Goal: Find a token the app leaked in a query-string parameter of a GET request.

Open Wireshark on your active interface and start a capture. Display filter for this level: http.request. No GUI? sudo tcpdump -i any -w cap.pcap port 9080.
Open the plaintext lab and click Generate traffic once.
Stop the capture. The secret is in the query string of the GET /search request line. The whole URL is on the wire. Read the request line and take the token=… parameter value.

Genuinely unencrypted — the secret exists only on the wire, never on the page.

Open in order — they nudge, not solve.

Hint 1

The request line itself carries data. Filter http.request and look at the GET paths.

Hint 2

One request is GET /search?token=…. The whole URL is in cleartext on the wire.

Hint 3

The token value (URLTOKEN-…) is the answer. This is why secrets never belong in URLs.