OSINT CTF Walkthroughs

Walkthrough # 1

Title = Recovering information from a pixelated airline ticket Using OSINT

Introduction :

This challenge involved analyzing a heavily pixelated airline boarding pass using legal OSINT techniques. The objective was to identify the passenger's first and last name, seat number, and arrival airport IATA code from the remaining visible details.

Objectives :

Determine the following information:

• Passenger's first name
• Passenger's last name
• Seat number
• Arrival airport IATA code

The required flag format was:

OSINT{NAME_SURNAME_SEATNUMBER_AIRPORTIATA}

Method :

• I downloaded the pixelated airline boarding pass provided as part of the challenge.
• To identify the original image, I used Yandex Images, a reverse image search engine that is often effective for finding visually similar images.
• I uploaded the pixelated boarding pass to Yandex and reviewed the search results.
• Among the results, I found a matching version of the boarding pass that revealed the previously hidden details.

From the matching image, I identified:

• Passenger Name: Michael Chen
• Seat Number: 3D
• The destination airport code was not directly obtained from the ticket. Instead, I used the destination information visible on the matching boarding pass to perform a web search and verify the corresponding IATA airport code.
• Through this lookup, I determined that the arrival airport's IATA code was PVG.

Flag:

OSINT{MICHAEL_CHEN_3D_PVG}

Evidence :

Walkthrough # 2

Title = Investigating the Creator of Holehe and Tracing the First Public Email .

Introdution :

In this OSINT challenge, the goal was to identify the creator of the Holehe tool, find the public email address associated with the project, and determine when that email first appeared online. I used only publicly available sources such as GitHub and other open-source resources to gather the required information.

Objectives :

• Identify the creator of the Holehe tool.
• Find the public email address associated with the project.
• Determine the exact date the email address first appeared online.
• Submit the flag in the required format: OSINT{DD-MM-YYYY}.

Method :

• I searched for Holehe in my browser and found its official GitHub repository. After opening the repository, I identified the project creator as megadose.
• I reviewed the public information available on the GitHub repository and found the email address associated with the project: megadose@protonmail.com
• Next, I searched for an OSINT tool that could provide information about the email address. I found Kriztalz.sh and entered the email address into the tool.
• The results showed the following creation date: 14–01–2021

Flag :

OSINT{14–01–2021}

Evidence :

Walkthrough # 3

TITLE : A TASTE OF INFLUENCE -PART2

Introduction :

In this OSINT challenge, the goal was to identify the personal email address associated with an individual using only publicly available information. Starting from a public professional profile, I followed digital footprints across different online sources to find the required email address.

Objectives :

• Analyze the provided public profile.
• Identify the individual's associated email address using legal OSINT techniques.
• Format the answer according to the required flag format: OSINT{EMAIL_ADDRESS}.

Method :

• I started by visiting the provided Gronda profile. The profile name was written in Russian, so I used Google Translate to translate it into English.
• Константин Гладких → Konstantin Gladkik
• From the profile, I also learned that the individual is a chef.
• Using the translated name and profession, I searched for Chef Konstantin Gladkik on Google to locate other public profiles associated with the individual.
• Among the search results, I found the individual's Instagram profile. The profile included a publicly listed contact email.
• The identified email address was: k.galdkih@mail.ru

Flag :

OSINT{k_DOT_gladkih_AT_mail_DOT_ru}

Evidence :

Walk Through # 4

TITLE : A TASTE OF INFLUENCE- PART3

Introdution :

Finding the Last Four Digits of a Phone Number Using OSINT .

Objectives :

• Use the previously identified email address as the starting point.
• Search publicly available sources for the associated phone number.
• Identify the last four digits of the phone number.
• Submit the answer in the required flag format: OSINT{XXXX}.

Method :

• I started with the information collected in Part 2, where I had already identified the individual's public Instagram profile through OSINT.
• I revisited the Instagram profile and examined the publicly available contact information. Along with the email address, the profile also displayed a phone number.
• From the publicly listed phone number, I extracted the last four digits, which were required to complete the challenge.

Flag :

OSINT{5410}

Evidence :

Walkthrough # 5 :

TITLE : A taste of influence -part 4

Information :

This challenge continued the investigation from the previous parts. Using the email address and phone number that had already been identified, the objective was to determine whether the individual had a public Strava account and recover the associated user ID using only open-source intelligence techniques.

Objectives :

• Use the email address and phone number identified in the previous challenges.
• Correlate the available information across public sources.
• Identify the individual's public Strava account.
• Recover the associated Strava user ID.
• Submit the answer in the required flag format: OSINT{STRAVA_ID}.

Method :

• I began by visiting the Strava website and searched for the individual using the English version of their name. However, the search results did not match the profile I was looking for.
• Since the English name did not return the correct result, I searched again using the individual's original Russian name: Константин Гладких
• This search returned the correct Strava profile.
• After opening the profile, I examined the URL of the page. The Strava profile URL contained the user's unique account ID.
• Strava User ID: 85856056

Flag :

OSINT{85856056}