S3cr3t_R3c1p3

My 50 cents to it. I hope it’s not too much spoiler. If so, please feel free to delete it.

Your recipe has two ingredients. The first one should be obvious because of RSA. For the 2nd one think of buying some balloons for a party and what you need to do with them before the party starts (= reversing what evil guys often do in their code for example to not being detected by some SIEM or perimeter rules).

Last, but not least: ignore the markers.

Waw what a waste of time.

Sorry to hear that.

Do we need to decrypt a random key?

It’s not an encryption. Otherwise it would have been in the crypto section.
It’s not stego either. Because we have a section for that on HTB.
So what could it be that would “sort of” fit forensic?

I don’t know but someones going to come knocking if I keep googling Meth-Cook

I’m still thinking how this could be a forensic challenge. Mods definitely need relook. Challenges getting worse these days.

Type your comment> @MrR3boot said:

I’m still thinking how this could be a forensic challenge. Mods definitely need relook. Challenges getting worse these days.

Truth to be told - It was hard to find a propper category for that. We might need a SOC / Blue-Team or whatever category for stuff like this.

I am sorry that you didn’t like the challenge. Maybe you could drop me your thought what it was that made the challenge so bad in your eyes.

Beside that - I gave the Mods a rundown on what I want to accomplish with this challenge and expected that they will try to solve the challenge and see if it makes remotely sense to another brain that doesn’t know the answer already. If a challenge isn’t working as intended - it should be rejected. 100%.

In this case the mods where sitting on my challenge for over a year before releasing it. So plenty of time to make some QA.

I’ll take your feedback as a learning exercise. Feel free to leave me some DMs so I can do better next time. Nobody got time for shitty challenges. :wink:

Cheers!
x41

Very easy one.

There is no reason whatsoever to believe that Cook encrypted the file. It is not implausible that public key is a public knowledge in this story and anybody could have encrypted this file. Poor chap was only trying to protect their private key. It is a setup.

Fantastic challenge! Thank you @x41 for it and @v1p3r0u5 for the genial party stuff hint here.

Thanks @Humi7. Glad you liked it. =)

i have an idea on how to cook it or maybe bake it but chef must let me know where to put what. right!?

Right. Except, you are the chef. :wink:

Type your comment> @v1p3r0u5 said:

My 50 cents to it. I hope it’s not too much spoiler. If so, please feel free to delete it.

Your recipe has two ingredients. The first one should be obvious because of RSA. For the 2nd one think of buying some balloons for a party and what you need to do with them before the party starts (= reversing what evil guys often do in their code for example to not being detected by some SIEM or perimeter rules).

Last, but not least: ignore the markers.

I read your hints and now I’m even MORE confused, lol! :smiley:

so i managed the challange after 3 day…
my first thoughts was to do something q and p and i saw the creators comment so i eliminated that one.
tried with op…s… but that didnt work so i went over to the cheef but the cheef didnt wanna cook any thing nor baking.
found the reason to why it didnt work and honestly i woudlnt figure it out if i didnt got a nudge from @mdghost .thanks mate

so if you find the right way to make the chef do the cooking then go over and ‘OPEN’ the file

thnkas @x41 for the challange

@x41 said:
Right. Except, you are the chef. :wink:

true but sometimes the chef dosent know if he should use pepper or salt or both…don wanna screw the food with bad recipes :smiley: :smiley:

Great challenge, 3 days later i can’t find a simple and logical solution for cook recipe after all the hints, I hope next hints on the next days, help me, congratulations for sharing this challenge,

@time2p1ay said:
Great challenge, 3 days later i can’t find a simple and logical solution for cook recipe after all the hints, I hope next hints on the next days, help me, congratulations for sharing this challenge,

If you know what’s the tool to bake your recipe, the hint from @v1p3r0u5 is enough to solve this challenge :wink:

You’re right, hint from @v1p3r0u5 have all ingredients to cook this challenge, thank you @mrnfrancesco and @v1p3r0u5.