Introduction
In this lab, you will explore how to customize a captive portal attack by selecting a specific language for the login page. A captive portal is a web page that users of a public-access network are obliged to view and interact with before access is granted. In a security context, tailoring the language of a captive portal can make a social engineering attack more convincing to a specific target audience.
You will use wifipumpkin3, a powerful framework for setting up rogue access points, to perform this task. The goal is to configure and launch a captive portal that displays its content in a language other than English, such as Spanish or German.
Initiate the Captive Portal Attack Flow
In this step, you will start the wifipumpkin3 tool. This tool provides a command-line interface for configuring and launching various network attacks. You need to run it with sudo because it requires elevated privileges to manage network interfaces and services.
Open your terminal and run the following command to start wifipumpkin3:
sudo wifipumpkin3
After the tool initializes, you will see its welcome banner and be presented with the wifipumpkin3 prompt, which looks like wp3 >. This indicates that the tool is ready to accept commands.
[... startup messages ...]
wifipumpkin3 > Framework Lanching...
__ ___ ___ ___ __ __ __ ___ __
| | \ | | |__ | | |__ |__) |__) / ` |__ |__)
| |__/ | | |___ | |___ |___ | \ | \ \__, |___ | \
==========================================================
Version: 1.1.4
Author: @mh4x0f
Quick-Help: help, help <command>
==========================================================
wp3 >
All subsequent commands in this lab will be entered at this wp3 > prompt.
Reach the 'Select a portal language' Menu
In this step, you will configure wifipumpkin3 to use a captive portal attack. This involves two main commands. First, you'll set the attack type to a Wi-Fi Access Point. Then, you'll specify the captiveflask plugin, which is responsible for creating the captive portal page.
At the wp3 > prompt, first select the access point attack module:
use wifi.accesspoint
Next, select the captiveflask plugin to manage the captive portal:
use captive.captiveflask
After running these commands, wifipumpkin3 is now configured to create a rogue Wi-Fi network with a captive portal. The prompt will change to reflect the currently active modules.
wp3 > use wifi.accesspoint
[wp3: wifi.accesspoint] > use captive.captiveflask
[wp3: wifi.accesspoint > captive.captiveflask] >
Review the List of Available Language Templates
In this step, you will view the list of available language templates for the captive portal. The captiveflask plugin comes with several pre-built templates for different languages. You can list them using the show command.
The parameter that controls the language is captive.captiveflask.language. To see all available options for this parameter, run the following command at the prompt:
show captive.captiveflask.language
The tool will display a list of available language codes. Each code corresponds to a specific language template.
[wp3: wifi.accesspoint > captive.captiveflask] > show captive.captiveflask.language
INFO: list of available languages:
- en
- es
- fr
- de
- it
- pt
- ru
- ar
- zh
This list shows you the different languages you can choose for your captive portal page.
Choose a Non-English Language like Spanish or German
In this step, you will select a non-English language for your captive portal. Based on the list from the previous step, you can choose any language by using its two-letter code. We will use Spanish (es) as an example.
To set the language, use the set command followed by the parameter name and the desired value. Run the following command to change the portal language to Spanish:
set captive.captiveflask.language es
The tool will confirm that the parameter has been updated.
[wp3: wifi.accesspoint > captive.captiveflask] > set captive.captiveflask.language es
[+] SET captive.captiveflask.language => es
You have now successfully configured the captive portal to use the Spanish language template. You could have also chosen de for German, fr for French, or any other available code.
Proceed to Launch the Attack with the Selected Language
In this step, with all configurations in place, you will launch the attack. The start command will initiate the rogue access point and activate the captive portal with the Spanish language template you selected.
At the prompt, simply type start and press Enter:
start
The tool will begin setting up the necessary network services. You will see a series of log messages indicating that the access point, DHCP server, and captive portal are being activated.
[wp3: wifi.accesspoint > captive.captiveflask] > start
[*] Starting AP...
...
[*] Captive portal running at http://10.0.0.1:80
...
The captive portal is now active. If a user were to connect to this Wi-Fi network, they would be redirected to a login page displayed in Spanish.
To stop the attack and exit the tool, press Ctrl+C. This concludes the lab.
Summary
In this lab, you successfully configured and launched a captive portal attack with a customized language setting. You learned how to use the wifipumpkin3 framework to initiate an attack, select the captiveflask plugin, and review the available language options. By setting the language to Spanish, you saw how easily a captive portal can be localized to target a specific audience, making it a more effective tool for security testing and social engineering engagements.