At this stage, you should be at a level
where you are able to discover bugs in real-life platforms.
So I showed you how to discover a large number
of bugs and vulnerabilities.
I showed you how you could discover them
in different scenarios.
I showed you how you can bypass security and filtering.
And at the end, I even showed you my own strategy
to testing websites and applications
and discovering bugs and vulnerabilities in them.
So at this stage, you should be able to go ahead
and discover your own bugs and vulnerabilities
and hopefully cash some money for that.
So the only thing that we haven't covered so far,
how do you go ahead and start hunting for bugs?
Now, before I show you where to start and how to start,
it's very important to understand where not to start.
So you want to make sure
that you do not test applications without permission.
So you can't simply just go ahead,
load the website, and start discovering bugs in it
and then start contacting the admin
of the website out of nowhere.
This is illegal.
You're testing a website with no permission.
So you have to understand that.
Instead, you should test applications and websites
that actually have a real, proper bug bounty program.
And there is so many of them.
So all you have to do is simply go on Google
and look for bug bounty programs,
or you could look for bug bounty platforms.
And these platforms provide everything that you need
in order to start bug hunting,
from the process of discovering websites
with proper bug bounty programs,
to submitting the bugs,
to communicating with the website security team or owners,
all the way up to the point
where you actually get paid your bounty.
So if you're a beginner, I highly recommend starting here.
But just for the sake of completion,
I'm just gonna go quickly
and just run a quick Google search just to see
what bug bounty programs are available right now.
So as you can see, I just typed in bug bounty programs.
This is an ad for a bug bounty platform,
and we will talk about that in a second.
But as you can see, you have a lot of websites
that are listing other websites
that have a valid bug bounty program,
which means that you could go ahead and start testing them
for bugs and vulnerabilities.
But like I said, you should leave that for later,
until you actually have a better understanding
of the whole process and how the communication happens
once you discover a bug.
So I highly recommend starting
with a bug bounty platform that, like I said,
makes the whole process much easier and more fun.
Again, there's a lot of bug bounty platforms.
So all you have to do is look for bug bounty platform
or platforms if you want to get a list of them.
There is so many of them.
I will include the list in the resources as well myself.
But the main one and the most popular one is HackerOne,
which you probably already heard of.
And once you go to their website,
you will notice that it might be a little bit confusing.
And the reason for that,
because they are trying to target the companies.
That's why the website is styled and designed in a way
that it seems like it's really hard to sign up for and use,
because it's designed to get companies to sign up,
not hackers.
Now, a quick note before I continue covering this platform
Don't get intimidated by it.
This is the biggest bug bounty platform right now.
You will probably not gonna start using it straight away.
There are other simpler bug bounty platforms
that you should start with,
but I'm just covering this to show you how to use it.
Because like I said, it is the biggest bug bounty platform.
So the first thing you want to do is sign up
with this website.
Just like any other website that you use,
you need to create an account on it.
So you can simply just click on Login.
And here at the bottom,
you have a link to create an account.
So you're just gonna click on Create account.
And it's asking you, are you a hacker or a company?
So we are hackers.
We want to start discovering bugs.
So we're gonna click on a hacker account.
The rest of the process is very, very simple.
You have to fill up your name, a username, your email,
put a password, create an account,
and then it's gonna send you a verification email.
You have to verify it,
and then you'll have your account properly registered
and verified on this website.
I'm not gonna cover that process
because it is very, very simple.
Once you have an account, you can simply click on Login
and put in your username and your password.
You're gonna click on Sign in.
And once you sign in,
because we signed in to a hacker's account,
you will see that the platform kind of changes
and becomes more geared towards a hacker,
towards someone that actually wants
to discover bugs and vulnerabilities.
So as you can see, you automatically get redirected
to the Opportunities page,
where you can see all of the bug bounty programs available
on this website.
And we have the search bar in here,
which you could use to search for a specific program.
You could also filter based on the type of the program.
So BBP is short for bug bounty program.
VDP is a vulnerability disclosure program.
And then they also offer private programs.
You could search based on the asset type.
So, for example, if you want to specify the domain,
if you're looking for iOS apps or Android apps
or websites and other, all kinds of stuff.
So like I said, this is a huge platform
that has all kinds of bug bounty programs.
You can even select the industry,
like automotive or computer software.
And as you can see, you have a big list in here.
Or if you don't want to do any of this,
you can simply just scroll down
and see programs based on the industry,
based on the bounties.
You can see assets that you might be interested in.
So this is basically just a discovery page
where you could find bug bounty programs to participate in.
And if you don't find this very useful,
you could also go to the directory.
And it'll actually just list the programs
in a nice list view.
So this might be a bit simpler for you to go through.
And as you can see,
you can already notice a lot of famous websites,
like Amazon, GameStop, LinkedIn,
and the list goes on.
They have PayPal. They have Tesla.
They have everybody in here, eToro.
So you should go through this list
and see which program is most appropriate for you.
And you can decide that by clicking on the program
to get more information about it.
And you can see, for example, the rewards that they give.
So for a low vulnerability,
you get about 100 to 250.
For a medium, you get 250 to 2,500.
For high and for critical, you get these values.
So from here, you can get an idea,
do I want to invest time
into discovering bugs in this platform?
Because, for example,
some platforms might not even give money.
They might just give you points or swag,
like t-shirts or stickers and so on.
So you might not want to invest your time in that.
You might only want to get money.
So it really depends on your criteria, on your requirement.
But as someone that is only starting,
you should actually be looking for programs
that do not pay a lot of money.
It might seem stupid
because obviously you want to make the most money possible.
But the thing is, the programs with the higher rewards
will attract the best hackers out there.
And there are some amazing hackers out there
that do this full time.
So even if you actually manage to discover a bug
or a vulnerability in these platforms and send it,
these really good hackers have probably discovered it
and sent it before you.
And therefore, your bug will be considered as a duplicate.
And as a result, you will not be paid.
Also, programs with high rewards are usually run
by more secure websites.
And by that, I don't mean that they're not vulnerable.
I just mean that they are more challenging,
and it's harder to discover bugs
and vulnerabilities in them.
Therefore, it's best to start with programs
that are not very popular,
that do not give a lot of rewards,
so that your chances of actually discovering bugs
and getting a bounty for it is high.
And then build up your experience, build up your confidence,
and then move your way up the ladder from there.
Scrolling down, you're gonna get the policy
for this particular bug bounty program.
Now, this is different depending
on the program that you selected.
So the policy that you see in here
in LinkedIn is gonna be completely different
than the policy that you're gonna see
in a different website,
for example, Linktree in here.
As you can see, even the rewards are different.
So that's why you want to go through all of these programs
and see the rewards, the policy.
And before you start engaging, it is very important
to understand this policy very, very well.
So you want to make sure you understand the rules
and you don't break them.
You want to make sure that you test the things
that are in scope.
So if we scroll in here, it tells you what you can test.
So only the assets mentioned in here,
only the domains mentioned in here are eligible.
So as you can see, you have all of the domains
that are eligible for testing.
If you scroll down, you also see the stuff
that is out of the scope.
So these assets and these domains should not be tested.
And even if you discover a very critical bug
or vulnerability in these assets,
you will not get a bounty.
And you will also be breaking the law
because they're clearly telling you
that this is out of scope.
And there is nothing more annoying to a company
or a researcher that is running a bug bounty platform
other than getting a report
on something that they clearly told you it's out of scope.
So we don't care if it's vulnerable.
We don't care if it's very scary.
We tell you it's out of scope, it means do not test it.
So it's very important to only test the stuff
that is in scope, and it's also very important
to test the vulnerabilities that they tell you.
So sometimes in here, they would actually tell you,
"I do not want excessive vulnerabilities."
Now, that's highly unlikely, but it's possible.
Or they might tell you,
"I do not want remote code execution."
So even if you manage to get it
and you spend months trying to get it,
you will not get your bounty because we clearly told you
that we do not want these vulnerabilities.
So that's a quick look on HackerOne.
I highly recommend creating an account
and going through the programs.
But like I said, do not get intimidated by this platform.
This is the biggest one,
and it has really big bug bounty programs,
ones that pay you hundreds of thousands of dollars.
So you probably will not be using this.
Like I said, you will be using this maybe
later on in the future.
But I just wanted to give you a quick walkthrough
over it right now.
And I am gonna show you simpler bug bounty programs
in the next lecture,
where you should be starting your journey
into becoming an expert bug hunter.