Bypassing Next

Generation
2FA & MFA
Implementation

Dr. M. Shahmeer Amir

Younite/Authiun/Veiliux
[email protected]
 About me:
• Shahmeer Amir – 3rd Ranked bug bounty
hunter
• Hacked into 500 companies (Ethically) ;)
• CEO @ Younite/Veiliux/Authiun
• Web application/IoT/Wireless Security
researcher
• M.Sc. Cyber Security
• Ph.D. Applied Blockchain
Agenda

2FA, How it evolved over the years into MFA

Implementation of 2FA/MFA

Bypassing 2FA in Web & Mobile applications

Bypassing MFA using logical flaws

Bypassing Android Biometrics Authentication

Bypassing iOS Biometrics Authentication

Bypassing Mobile application MFA

Disclaimer
The research presented in this talk is a combination of my own research and
publications of different researchers. 2FA and MFA are ever-growing security
controls that evolve over-time, by no means is this research perfect but
provides an insight of how vulnerable 2FA and MFA implementations can be.
 2FA
• Two-factor authentication (2FA) is an identity and access
management security method that requires two forms of
identification to access resources and data.

How 2FA became MFA

• Multi-factor authentication (MFA) is a security control
that requires users to verify their identities by providing
multiple pieces of evidence before gaining access to a
device or application.

• Two-factor authentication (2FA) always utilizes two of

these factors to verify the user’s identity. Multi-factor
authentication (MFA) could involve two of the factors or it
could involve all three. “Multi-factor” just means any
number of factors greater than one.
2FA working and architecture
2FA and MFA implementations
Bypassing 2FA in Web and Mobile apps

Brute Force
Request
and it’s OAuth Bypass
method
bypasses

Broken session
Response code Random
management
manipulation Backup Codes
bypass

Input
Forced
CSRF parameter
Browsing
poisoning

Code 2FA code

Reusability Leakage
Tools

• Client-side proxy
• Number wordlists
• Proxy servers list file
Brute Force and it’s bypasses

• Brute force is a cryptographic attack where an attacker tries to guess an authentication

code until the correct sequence is found. This is easier to do if the codes are 4 digits
(0000-9999) but more difficult to accomplish if the code is six digits or longer. The longer
the authentication code, the better to thwart this type of attack.
Bypassing Grab App 2FA – API call brute force
• API call request vulnerable brute force
parameter “profileActivationCode”

Bypassing Grab App 2FA – API call brute force

• Upon a successful 2FA attempt, the
response length changed to 2250 bytes,
indicating a change in response
Bypassing Slack 2FA – Rate Limitation on Reset
Bypassing Dashlane 2FA – HTTP Headers

• Sending large amounts of requests using brute force

• When hit with a throttle limit
• Add X-Forwarded-Host header with locahost IP 127.0.0.1
By adding the X-Forwarded-For header, an attacker can bypass the throttling completely,
rendering the security measure ineffective against DOS attacks.
Bypassing Microsoft 2FA – Concurrent requests (Zerohack)

• The 2FA limitation protection was based on IP address blacklisting.

 Bypassing Microsoft 2FA –
Bypassing Microsoft 2FA –
Concurrent requests (Zerohack) -
Concurrent requests (Zerohack)
Cont
• The bypass consisted of sending all of the requests Putting all together, an attacker has to
concurrently at the same time with a delay no more than send all the possibilities of 6 and 7 digit
10 milliseconds security codes that would be around 11
million request attempts and it has to be
sent concurrently to change the password
of any Microsoft account

Broken authentication & session

management
• Exploiting a broken authentication, an attack is typically
initiated by taking advantage of poorly managed credentials
and login sessions to masquerade as authenticated users,
this can result in bypassing 2FA implementations
Bypassing Facebook 2FA – Session Flaw

• Go to donate to any organization from

Facebook on iOS
https://www.facebook.com/donate/xxx/xxx/
• Try to make a donation
https://m.facebook.com/donation/login/?nonce=xxx
xxx&uid=xxxxxx
• You will be redirected to endpoint
• Copy this link and try to use it from another
device which you didn’t signed-in with your
Account before.
• Go to Facebook.com then you will be redirected
automatically to the victim account.
• Getting access into the Facebook account
without 2FA
Bypassing MapBox 2FA – Password Reset Session
Bypassing Instagram iOS 2FA – Session Management

• A user can set 2FA to secure his/her

Instagram account so that no one can
successfully login to his/her account even
if anyone has the user’s login credentials.

• A vulnerability that allows attackers to fully

bypass the 2FA. 2FA check’s missing when
a user uses the ‘Secure account here’
option from the ‘Email changed’ mail
notification (that goes to the priorly
connected email).
Bypassing Instagram iOS 2FA – Session Management

User B may be asked to verify if

User B logs-into User A’s User B clicks the ‘Secure your ([email protected]) belongs to him;
Instagram account. account here’ option there. which he verifies using User A’s
email login credentials.

User A now sets 2FA security

User B replaces User A’s email User B successfully bypasses
for his Instagram account.
address ([email protected]) with his 2FA there, thus creating an
Then; User B gets ‘Email
own email address active session of User A’s
changed on Instagram’
([email protected]) via the ‘Edit Instagram account without a
notification-email at his email
Profile’ option. 2FA check.
([email protected]).

User A also replaces the

User A finds/gets alert of the unrecognized email address
unrecognized login of his ([email protected]) from his profile
account. with his own email address
([email protected])

User A goes to login activity

User A then changes his
and revokes the unrecognized
Instagram account password.
session.
Bypassing Instagram iOS 2FA – Session Management (Contd)
CSRF
• CSRF is a commonly known vulnerability, In web and mobile application
implementations, there are times when the internal 2FA forms lack CSRF protection
and can be used to bypass 2FA entirely
Bypassing Mail RU 2FA via CSRF
Attacker goes to
https://pandao.ru/profile/set
tings and signs up for two
accounts. In which first is
attackers account and
second is Victim’s

Log in to Attackers account

and capture the Disable
2FA request in Burp suite
and generate CSRF poc.

Save the CSRF poc file

with extension .HTML.

Now log in into Victim’s

account in Private Browser
and fire that CSRF file.
Now you can see that It
disable 2FA which leads to
2FA Bypass.
Code reusability
• This technique refers to acquiring a 2FA code prior to the attack and re-using the code
after a certain period of time
Bypassing Wordpress 2FA – Reusing old codes

• This technique worked in

Wordpress website whereas an
was able to re-use the old 2FA
code found while enabling 2FA
2FA Code Leakage

• This technique refers to a flaw in implementation where the 2FA code is being leaked
in the application responses or internal files
Bypassing App 2FA – Leaking in HTTP response
Bypassing 2FA – Secret key disclosure

• This secret value is disclosed to all Admin type users and lower privilege users cannot
see this page. When a user enables the 2FA feature, he needs to scan that QR code in
Authenticator app and if we decode that QR code we see this format:-

otpauth://totp/<your-email>?secret=<totp_secret_key>&issuer=Target

• Here `totp_secret_key` value is unique for all users and cannot be brute forced. I took
this secret key from team page of other admin user and replaced value in above format. I
generated a QR code from a website and scanned this in the Authenticator app. Then I
tried login in with another user's credentials and entering OTP on 2FA page and it
worked.
Bypassing 2FA – Secret key disclosure
• Login to your account.
• Go to https://app.target.com/dashboard/team/
• In Burpsuite, You will see a GET request with a /api/dashboard/team/ URL in it.
• Send it to repeater
• You can see the totp_secret_key value of other users in the response.
• Copy the value and email address of that user. Paste both the value in this
otpauth://totp/your%40email.com?secret=[your-totp-secret-key]&issuer=Target
• Go to https://www.the-qrcode-generator.com/ and paste the crafted text in it.
• Your QR code will be generated. Scan it in authenticator app (DUO mobile) and it will accept
that QR code.
• Now logout from the website and enter the correct credentials of the victim user.
• Enter the code from the authenticator app and it will log in to you successfully.
Bypassing 2FA – Secret key disclosure
Input parameter poisoning
• Input Parameter Pollution (IPP) is an attack evasion technique that allows an attacker to
craft a HTTP request in order to manipulate or retrieve information .This technique
allows an attacker to poison the input parameter by using multiple techniques,
Bypassing Glassdoor 2FA – Nullbytes

• In simple terms, the 2FA while logging was be bypassed by sending a blank code. This
could have been because of incorrect comparison of entered code with true code.
Bypassing Paypal 2FA – Challenge & Response

Attacker selects
Attacker logs into Attacker enters
alternative option to
account incorrect answers
login CIT

Attacker removes
Attacker intercepts
“challenge” and
request with Burp
“response” fields –
Suite
Access Granted
Response manipulation

• This technique allows a user to bypass 2FA by manipulating the response of a certain
request via request interception. An attacker can change the response of a certain
request which in turn forces the server to change the response as well
Bypassing Unknown Site 2FA – Response Body
• An account with the 2FA authorization would receive a response similar to

• Whereas, a 2FA authentication enabled account would recieve a response similar to the
below one.
Bypassing Unknown Site 2FA – Response Body

• Checking here was the response of the login request.

• Website uses an Authorization token in it’s request, and this token is provided only if the
2FA step gets completed. The hidden response.
Bypassing Unknown Site 2FA – Response Body

• Step 1: Enter the user ID, password

and OTP for the attacker account.
Save the successful response of the
correct OTP.

• Step II: Enter the victim ID and

password while intercepting the
request, copy the mfavalue. Again
after entering the OTP (any arbitrary
value) intercept the response and
replace it with the saved response
from Step I, simultaneously changing
the values of mfavaluewith previously
copied one and auth with the stolen
one
Bypassing Finja E-Wallet 2FA – Response Code

Attacker
changes
Attacker response code
intercepts and
response with corresponding
Attacker puts data to 200 OK
incorrect Burp suite
response code Proxy
Attacker logs
into account
Bypassing Shapeshift 2FA – Response Code –Evan Ricafort
Random Backup Codes
• Backup codes are way to recover your 2FA codes when you do not have access to your
2FA device. In some applications, client-side checks are not implemented properly
 Bypassing Unknown Site 2FA – Backup Codes

After enabling 2FA, We got

Noting down all the backup There is an option to login
some backup codes in case So after entering the email
codes. The backup codes to the application using the
we don’t have access to the address and password.
were of 8 digits. backup codes.
device for the TOTP.

Clicking Use Backup

In short, there was no
Codes. And intentionally,
It is accepted and We were validation for the backup
putting a random 8-digit
successfully logged in to code. They were not
number instead of that 8
the application. validated and hence any
digit backup code and to
random 8 digit would work.
my surprise.
Request method
• Request methods such as GET, POST, PUT, DELETE are HTTP methods which are
sometimes used in applications in order interact as potential routing mechanisms
Bypassing Unknown Site 2FA - Delete method
• The POST method was used on the 2FA page after login mechanism
POST /api/v2/mfa/resend

And delete method is used to disable 2FA

DELETE /api/v2/mfa
• Replacing the POST method with DELETE disables 2FA on the 2FA login page
OAuth Bypass

• OAuth mechanisms are used to login users into accounts via social media integrations.
There implementations by default bypass 2FA allowing attackers to gain access to user
accounts
 Bypassing SalesforceIQ 2FA – Universal Oauth

Attacker
Attacker clicks on
compromises
“Login via
user's facebook
Facebook”
account

Attacker is granted
access to the
victim’s account
Bypassing OpenID 2FA - Universal

• OpenID Connect (OIDC) is an open authentication protocol that works on top of the OAuth
2.0 framework. Targeted toward consumers, OIDC allows individuals to use single sign-on
(SSO) to access relying party sites using OpenID Providers (OPs), such as an email
provider or social network, to authenticate their identities.
• The first thing that stood out was the acr_values parameter. The first and obvious idea was
to try removing the otp value and only keeping the password value. While I was correctly
redirected to the Identity Provider's login page, upon logging in with correct credentials, I
was always facing a 401 if the otp value was removed.
Bypassing OpenID 2FA – Universal (Contd)

• Basically, the acr_values parameter would tell the Identity Provider what authentication
methods the client requests. Upon fulfilling the login flow, the callback to the client
website will contain a JWT, which if decoded, would contain the AMR value used like so:

{"alg":"HS256","typ":"JWT"}.{"state":"123456789","auth_time":1234,"amr":["pwd","otp"] ...

• OpenID configurations relying on AMR should make sure to only accept trusted and
validated authentication methods.
Bypassing OpenID 2FA – Universal (Contd)

• Upon switching the acr_values value from

otp+password to sms+password and
entering the credentials
• I used a one time SMS verification service
and followed through the proccess. Upon
adding the phone number and confirming
ownership, I succesfully skipped the
Google Authenticator window and was also
logged in.
Forced Browsing
• Forced browsing is an attack technique against badly protected websites and web
applications, which allows the attacker to access resources that they should not be able
to access.
Bypassing 2FA via forced browsing in GET

• The website asked to enter the 2FA code and the url was like:
https://example.com/react-aspx/Authenticator.aspx

• An idea came to my mind to enter the url of the dashboard directly which was like:
https://example.com/home.aspx
• I was able to bypass 2FA and access the account.
Bypassing 2FA via forced browsing in POST

• Navigate to the signup page

• Click on signup with email
• Fill all the details.
• Now, Turn ON the burp Intercept.
• Click on Create account
• Capture the particular POST Request made to the
endpoint POST/_api/signup/verify
• Now Remove the /verify from the POST Request
• In the body of that post request
add “password”:”anypassword” without any
syntax mistakes. The final request should be like as
shown below
Bypassing Box’s 2FA – Using forced browsing

1. Attacker enrolls in multi-factor authentication using an authenticator app and stores the
device’s factor ID.
2. Attacker enters a user’s email address and password on account.box.com/login.
3. If the password is correct, the attacker’s browser is sent a new authentication cookie
and redirects to: /2fa/verification.
4. The attacker, however, does not follow the redirect to the SMS verification form. Instead,
they pass their own factor ID and code from the authenticator app to TOTP verification
endpoint: /mfa/verification.
5. The attacker is now logged in to the victim’s account and the victim does not receive an
SMS message.
Bypassing Box’s 2FA – Using forced browsing
Bypassing Box’s 2FA – Using forced
browsing
Bypassing MFA
• MFA is different from 2FA that because it allows options more than the codes and
iterations. MFA can be localize
Bypassing MFA

Phishing kits Legacy Protoclos Fatigue attacks voicemail

Wireless Guest
SIM Swapping MITM - Phishing
Network
Phishing kits

• Phishing (pronounced: fishing) is

an attack that attempts to steal
your money, or your identity, by
getting you to reveal personal
information. In this case, an
attacker can use Phishing to
bypass MFA of a user’s account
Bypassing MFA using Evilproxy
Bypassing MFA using VNC phishing kits
• A program called noVNC allows users to connect to a VNC server directly from within a
browser by simply clicking a link, which is when the researcher's new phishing technique
comes into play.
“When conducting the test, the researcher found that Google prevented logins when
detecting reverse proxies or man-in-the-middle (MiTM) attacks.”
"So how do we use noVNC to steal credentials & bypass 2FA? Setup a server with noVNC,
run Firefox (or any other browser) in kiosk mode and head to the website you’d like the user
to authenticate to (e.g. accounts.google.com)," explains a new report by mr.d0x on his new
phishing technique.
"Send the link to the target user and when the user clicks the URL they’ll be accessing the
VNC session without realizing. And because you’ve already setup Firefox in kiosk mode all
the user will see is a web page, as expected."
 Bypassing MFA using VNC phishing kits (Cont)
• Using this configuration, a threat actor can send out targeted spear-phishing emails that contain
links that automatically launch the target's browser and log into the attacker's remote VNC server.
• These links are highly customizable and allow the attacker to create links that don't look like
suspicious VNC login URLs, such as the ones below:
Example[.]com/index.html?id=VNCPASSWORD
Bypassing Microsoft MFA Using Phishing - ZScaler
• A new large-scale phishing campaign targeting credentials for Microsoft email services
use a custom proxy-based phishing kit to bypass multi-factor authentication.
• Some of the newly registered domains used in the campaign are typo-squatted versions
of legitimate Federal Credit Unions in the United States, as shown in the table below.
• Another set of phishing sites used domains names that focus on using password reset
lures as part of their email campaigns:

• expiryrequest-mailaccess[.]com
• expirationrequest-passwordreminder[.]com
• emailaccess-passwordnotice[.]com
• emailaccess-expirynotification[.]com
Bypassing Microsoft MFA Using Phishing - ZScaler
• The redirections occur via legitimate web
resources to help evade email and internet
security tools, with the threat actors
showing a preference for open redirects on
Google Ads, Snapchat, and DoubleClick.
Sadly, some platforms do not consider
open redirects a vulnerability, leaving them
available for abuse by threat actors.
Bypassing Microsoft MFA Using Phishing - ZScaler
Once the victim reaches the phishing page, they are fingerprinted by JavaScript, which
evaluates if the target is on a virtual machine or a normal device.
Legacy Protocols

• One tactic threat actors consistently use to

bypass MFA is the use of legacy authentication.
Legacy authentication can be used for mail
protocols where MFA was historically not
supported such as IMAP4, POP3 or SMTP, or for
older Outlook and mobile clients that do not
support MFA.
• As long as legacy authentication is enabled, the
possibility that threat actors can log into an M365
account without satisfying MFA requirements may
exist, allowing the threat actor full access to read,
write and download a full copy of the impacted
user’s mailbox to their local (threat actor
controlled) system.
Bypassing MFA Using Mailsniper & MFASweep

• For a long time, the tool MailSniper was a go to for bypassing MFA. The tool’s
“Invoke-SelfSearch” functionality used Exchange Web Services (EWS) to
programmatically log in to a compromised account and extract information from an
employee’s inbox.
• A new tool was also released called MFASweep that tests various authentication
methods potentially bypassing MFA.
MFA Fatigue attacks

• Multi-factor authentication (MFA) fatigue is the name given to a technique used by

adversaries to flood a user’s authentication app with push notifications in the hope they
will accept.
MFA Fatigue attacks

• It only requires the attacker to

manually, or even automatically,
send repeated push notifications
while trying to log into the victim’s
account
• Once the victim clicks on the link
provided by you then you will
easily get every deep information
about his device.
Bypassing MFA using Device Fatigue Attacks

• Grabify to acquire User-Agent of the victim

• Reuse it in the Login request of Burpsuite
Bypassing MFA using Location Fatigue Attacks

• Acquire the user’s well-known location i.e.

Home or Office location
• Spoof the location using GPS Simulators
MFA Fatigue attacks - Demonstration
Voicemail
• In MFA we have options to listen to the code and than enter it into the application. If
the phone number is occupied or busy, the code is sent to voicemail instead.
Bypassing MFA using Voicemail hijacking
Bypassing MFA using Voicemail hijacking – Brute-force
Bypassing MFA using Voicemail hijacking – Compromising Paypal
Sim Swapping
• In a SIM swapping attack, an attacker transfers a mobile phone account and phone
number to a new SIM card. Since this new SIM card is under the attacker’s control, they
can insert it into a device and send or receive SMS messages and phone calls directed to
the victim.
Bypassing MFA using Sim Swapping attack
Stolen SAML Certificates

• SAML is an open authentication and authorization standard. SAML or Security Assertion

Markup Language, is commonly used by web applications to authenticate users via a
third party identity provider such as AzureAD, Duo or even Facebook. SAML relies on a
cryptographic trust between the web app or “service provider” (SP) and an “identity
provider” (IdP).

• When a user authenticates to an SP, they are redirected to the IdP to authenticate.
Upon successful authentication to the IdP, a cryptographically signed “SAML Assertion”
is given to the user to complete their authentication with the SP.
Bypassing MFA via Golden SAML
Impersonate either the
AD FS service account Extract the following The target cloud user's
Compromise an AD FS
or a local administrator data from the ObjectGUID and
server.
account on an AD FS environment: UserPrincipalName • An attacker had to perform the
server. following steps to conduct a
Golden SAML attack:

Trust Issuer Address:

The URL that the cloud EncryptedPfx: The The following values The Active Directory
uses to connect the on- encrypted token-signing from the AD FS Distributed Key Manager
premises environment to certificate configuration settings: (DKM) master key
the cloud

Decrypt the
Build the SAML token Use the decrypted
EncryptedPfx with the
using the target cloud token-signing certificate Pass the signed SAML
DKM master key to
user’s ObjectGUID and to cryptographically sign token to the cloud.
obtain the decrypted
UserPrincipalName. the SAML token.
token-signing certificate.

The cloud provider logs The cloud provider

the user into the target validates the signature
cloud resource. of the SAML token.
MITM - Phishing

• Traditional phishing attacks will often clone a website or attempt to drop malware to
compromise and steal sensitive data from the phished victim. However, the use of multi-
factor authentication (MFA) can mitigate cases where sensitive data is stolen, as this
adds an extra layer of protection required to access the account or service.
Bypassing MFA using MITM and Phishing

• To carry out MITM phishing, an attacker uses

URLs that closely resemble the victim’s
intended destination, which is used to direct
the victim to a reverse proxy server.
• Usually, a reverse proxy server sits in front of
a webserver to help balance the network load
and provide increases in performance,
reliability, and security.
• In MITM phishing attacks, the proxy server is
used by the attacker to intercept the network
communication between the victim’s computer
and the real web server.
Bypassing MFA using MITM and Phishing

• In this test, we used an AWS EC2 instance running

Ubuntu 20.04 OS, installed with the open-source
tools OpenSSL, keytool, certbot, and Evilginx2,
which is a MITM toolkit.
• To resolve the attacker’s URL and ensure that
victims get directed to the reverse proxy server,
Evilginx2 provides a built-in DNS function.
Bypassing MFA using MITM and Phishing

• Once ready, the attacker needs to

socially engineer the victim to
access the desired service through
the attacker’s URL, which is
mirroring the real website.
• Aside from the URL and the TLS
certificate, the rest is exactly the
same, as the attacker is simply
intercepting the traffic between the
victim and the real website.
 Bypassing MFA using MITM and Phishing

• When the victim accesses the

website through the attacker’s
URL, the framework captures
all the sensitive data, such as
IP addresses, username, and
password, which are redacted
in the image below.
Biometric Authentication

• Biometric authentication, as its name implies, is a

client-side authentication method that relies on
the user’s biometric data, be it his fingerprint or
face.
Bypassing Biometrics Authentication - Tools
• Rooted device or a malicious application
containing a Frida gadget
• Frida
• VS Code or other text editors
Bypassing Android Biometric Authentication
• The Android Keystore is a system that allows developers to create and store
cryptographic keys in a secure container, making them difficult to extract from the
device, even using advanced techniques. These cryptographic keys are stored within
specialized hardware known as TEE(Trusted Execution Environment).
• Fingerprint authentication can be implemented using either the FingerprintManager or
BiometricPrompt and nested classes that manage the authentication mechanism, and
an application dialogue asking the user to authenticate.
• After successful login using username and password, the user can choose to
authenticate with the device’s biometric, thus the application creates an object that is
placed in the Keystore and accessed when the fingerprint is valid.
Bypassing Android Biometric Authentication

• As you might imagine, there are multiple ways of bypassing the Android Biometric
Authentication. One requires the lack of usage of the crypto object, which means that
the authentication object is not stored in the Keystore, so it does not require a valid
fingerprint to unlock the application.
• Another method involves bypassing the insecure usage of the crypto object, which
means that if the key is not used to decrypt any data in the application, the
authentication can be bypassed.
Bypassing Android Biometrics Authentication – Crypto Object
• The authentication implementation relies on the callback onAuthenticationSucceded
being called. The researchers from F-Secure developed a Frida script that can be used
to bypass the NULL CryptoObject in onAuthenticationSucceeded(…). The script will
automatically bypass the fingerprint when the aforementioned method is called. Here is a
short example that shows the bypass for the Android Fingerprint. The complete
application can be downloaded from my GitHub.
Bypassing Android Biometrics Authentication – Crypto Object
Bypassing Android Biometrics Authentication – Exception Handling

• All the script needs to do is manually call the onAuthenticationSucceded with a non-
authorized (not unlocked by fingerprint) CryptoObject stored in the Keystore.
• The catch is if the application will attempt to use another cipher object, then an exception
will be thrown. This script will attempt to call onAuthenticationSucceded and catch the
exception javax.crypto.IllegalBlockSizeException in Cipher class. From now on, any objects
the application uses will be encrypted using this new key.
Bypassing Android Biometrics Authentication – Exception Handling
Bypassing iOS Biometrics Authentication

• During a local authentication, an app authenticates the user against credentials stored
locally on the device. In other words, the user “unlocks” the app or some inner layer of
functionality by providing a set of valid biometric characteristics such as face or
fingerprint, which is verified by referencing local data.
Bypassing iOS Biometrics Authentication

• Shortly, the Local Authentication

framework provides facilities for
requesting Touch ID
authentication from users.
Developers can display and use
an authentication prompt using
the function evaluatePolicy of
the LAContext class. The main
drawback of this approach is
that the function returns a
boolean value, not a
cryptographic object that can be
further used to decrypt sensitive
data stored inside the Keychain.
• Vulnerable Code Snippet ->
Bypassing iOS Biometrics Authentication – evaluatePolicy check

• Now, to be able to bypass the Local

Authentication, we have to write a Frida
script that bypasses the aforementioned
evaluatePolicy check. As you can see in
the above-pasted code snippet, the
evaluatePolicy uses a callback that
determines the result. So, the easiest
way to achieve the hack is to intercept
that callback and make sure it always
returns the success=1.
Bypassing iOS Biometrics Authentication – evaluatePolicy check
Bypassing iOS Biometrics Authentication – Objection

• Another valid method used to bypass the iOS Biometric Local Authentication is to use
objection and its pre-build script. Firstly, attach the object to the target application.

• Now use the pre-built Objection script for fingerprint bypasses.

Bypassing iOS Biometrics Authentication – Objection
Bypassing Fingerprint Scan

• Kraken notes that biometric security has become increasingly common as

smartphone, tablet, and laptop manufacturers have incorporated fingerprint scanners
into their products. These scanners offer a convenient way to access those devices
without entering a password.

“Our tests showed that—on average—we achieved an ~80 percent success rate while
using the fake fingerprints, where the sensors were bypassed at least once," Cisco Talos
says. "Reaching this success rate was difficult and tedious work. We found several
obstacles and limitations related to scaling and material physical properties. Even so, this
level of success rate means that we have a very high probability of unlocking any of the
tested devices before it falls back into the pin unlocking.”
Bypassing Fingerprint Scan
Bypassing Whatsapp MFA
• In Android, WhatsApp “Screen Lock” feature
allows the user to lock the app using available
device biometric credentials (Fingerprint, Face ID,
PIN, and Pattern).
• The “Auto Lock” feature will lock the app
automatically after user-specified duration. If the
user opted for “1 minute”, then the app will be
locked after 1 minute of inactivity.
• The issue here is, if the user receives a
WhatsApp call from someone after 1 minute or
later, then the app FAILS to lock. So an attacker
can easily bypass the biometric lock just by
making a call and rejecting it to access the app
completely (read chats, send messages…).
Bypassing Whatsapp MFA

• Enable biometric lock and set auto lock

duration (1 min or any).
• Close the app.
• After 1 minute or later, make a call to that
device.
• Reject the incoming call and open
WhatsApp.

“Any screen inactivity listener”: WhatsApp will

be auto-locked after timeout even if the user
minimized it from any activity like chat, home,
or settings screen. To implement this,
WhatsApp registers “Activity Lifecycle
Callback” in the {Application.class}.”
Bypassing Whatsapp MFA – Code Flow
When the call is received, {CallActivity.class} is started.
After the call is ended, {CallActivity.class} is closed and the method {onActivityPaused()} is
called.
• Method: onActivityPaused()
Stores the current “device up time” {SystemClock.elapsedTime()} as {app closed time}.

Now when the app is reopened,

method {onActivityResumed()} is called.
• Method: onActivityResumed()
It calculates the “time difference” between current “device up time” and the stored {app closed
time}. If it is > {user specified duration}, then only it will lock the app.

It fails to lock now because the {app closed time} is saved after the call is ended and the
“time difference” is < {user specified duration}.
Bypassing Google Pixel MFA – David Schutz

Enter the wrong PIN

Lock the phone Reboot it
code 3 times

Enter the PUK code

Choose a new PIN
to unlock the SIM
Bypassing Google Pixel MFA
Bypassing Retina Scan

Take a photo of the person’s eye

• Lens Specs: 200 mm

• Distance: 15 mm
• Print: High Quality Color Copy
• Use a Wet lens over it and it will be unlocked a

With a sufficient amount of time and complete

access to the phone, you could theoretically unlock
any Galaxy S series with iris scanning enabled.
Bypassing FaceID - Research

• The Secure Enclave Process

The images captures by Face ID are kept in the
encrypted memory of Apple's special co-processor, which
is called SEP.

• SEP OS lacks basic exploit protections e.g. No

memory layout randomization
• Shared PMGR and PLL are open to attacks
• Inclusion of the fuse source pin should be re-
evaluated
• The demotion functinoality appears rather dangerous

During the Black Hat USA conference in Las Vegas,

researchers demonstrated a Face ID bypass method that
used glasses and tape to unlock and infiltrate the iPhone
of an "unconscious" victim.
Solution?
• Authiun
End Note

• For any comments and suggestions about

this talk, Please reach out to me on
LinkedIN “Shahmeer Amir” or email me on
[email protected]
Thank You for your time.
SMS based OTP

The OTP is generated by the service provider

and sent to the mobile network operator
(MNO) that delivers the OTP via SMS to the
user.
Third-party time-based tokens

Time-based one-time password is a

computer algorithm that generates a one-
time password that uses the current time as a
source of uniqueness. It is usually done via
third party apps like Authy & Google
Authenticator
Push Notification
Push notification authentication is a third-
party app that helps verify the identity of an
user attempting to access a registered
account by sending an access request to the
device associated with the account before
the access is granted.
Challenge Based

Challenge Response Authentication

Mechanism (CRAM) is the most often used
way to authenticate actions. They are a group
of protocols in which one side presents a
challenge(to be answered) and the other side
must present a correct answer(to be
checked/validated) to the challenge in order to
get authenticated
Email Based

The Email OTP method enables you to

authenticate using the one-time
password (OTP) that is sent to the
registered email address.
FIDO U2F

Universal Second Factor (U2F) is a

relatively new style of 2FA, typically
using small USB, NFC or Bluetooth
Low Energy (BTLE) devices often
called “security keys.”
Biometrics

Biometric 2FA, or biometric authentication,

is a method of verifying a user’s identity
using a piece of “who they are” such as
their fingerprint, facial features, hand
shape, iris structure, voice, or typing
behavior
Bonus: Backup Codes

Sites will often give you a set of ten backup

codes to print out and use in case your phone
is dead or you lose your security key. Hard-
copy backup codes are also useful when
traveling, or in other situations where your
phone may not have signal or reliable charging.

[email protected]