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UofTCTF'24: repeat

This was a standard XOR challenge, where we are given the ciphertext and the encryption algorithm. We then need to get the plaintext, i.e. the flag.

The Challenge

I'm a known repeat offender when it comes to bad encryption habits. But the secrets module is secure, so you'll never be able to guess my key!

We are given two files: gen.py and flag.enc.

gen.py:

import os
import secrets

flag = "REDACATED"
xor_key = secrets.token_bytes(8)

def xor(message, key):
    return bytes([message[i] ^ key[i % len(key)] for i in range(len(message))])

encrypted_flag = xor(flag.encode(), xor_key).hex()

with open("flag.enc", "w") as f:
    f.write("Flag: "+encrypted_flag)

flag.enc:

Flag: 982a9290d6d4bf88957586bbdcda8681de33c796c691bb9fde1a83d582c886988375838aead0e8c7dc2bc3d7cd97a4

The Analysis

We know a few things:

  1. The flag is encrypted using XOR.
    • XOR can be reversed by XORing the ciphertext with the key to get the plaintext.
  2. The key is a random 8-byte string.
  3. The flag likely starts with uoftctf{.

The Solution

To solve this challenge, we need to:

  1. Get the key. Knowing that the starting plaintext of the flag, and that the key is 8 bytes long, we can get all 8 bytes of the key by XORing the first 8 bytes of the ciphertext with uoftctf{.
  2. Decrypt the ciphertext. With the key, we can XOR the ciphertext with the key to get the plaintext.

To simplify the process, I wrote a python script to do the above steps.

def xor_key(known, encrypted_part):
    return bytes([known[i] ^ encrypted_part[i] for i in range(len(known))])

def decrypt(cipher, xor_key):
    encrypted_bytes = bytes.fromhex(cipher)
    decrypted_bytes = bytes([encrypted_bytes[i] ^ xor_key[i % len(xor_key)] for i in range(len(encrypted_bytes))])
    return decrypted_bytes.decode()

known = "uoftctf{"

with open("flag.enc", "r") as f:
    cipher = f.read().split(" ")[1]

key_length = len(known)

known_encrypted_part = cipher[:key_length * 2]

xor_key = xor_key(known.encode(), bytes.fromhex(known_encrypted_part))

pt = decrypt(cipher, xor_key)

print(pt)

While not the most elegant solution, it can nicely solve the challenge.

uoftctf{x0r_iz_r3v3rs1bl3_w17h_kn0wn_p141n73x7}