ffuf Tutorial – alternative to Gobuster

Welcome to our in-depth ffuf tutorial, where we guide you through the versatile web fuzzing tool ffuf (Fast web fuzzer), a potent weapon in any cybersecurity professional’s arsenal. This guide is designed to provide a complete understanding of ffuf’s features, installation steps, and usage with rich examples for various cases.

ffuf Tutorial

Key Features of Ffuf

Ffuf stands out with an extensive set of formidable features that make it the go-to choice for professionals:

  • Multi-threaded with the capability to perform rapid fuzzing operations.
  • Flexible HTTP proxy support to inspect HTTP request/response.
  • Capable of fuzzing both GET and POST parameters.
  • Support for various types of HTTP authentication (Basic, Digest, NTLM).
  • Automation friendly with JSON output format.
  • Highly configurable for different workflows (e.g., simultaneous header and POST data fuzzing).
  • Replay-proxy feature for manual inspection of specific requests.

Installation Steps

To get started with ffuf, you’ll need to follow these simple installation steps:

  1. Make sure you have go installed on your system.
  2. Install ffuf using the Go toolchain:
    go get -u github.com/ffuf/ffuf
  3. After the installation, confirm it’s correctly installed by running
    ffuf -h

    which will display the help menu.

Basic Usage of Ffuf

At its core, ffuf’s primary usage is to discover elements and directories within a website. A typical command looks like this:

ffuf -w wordlist.txt -u http://example.com/FUZZ

Here, -w stands for a wordlist and -u for the URL you are fuzzing with a placeholder FUZZ that will be replaced by lines from the wordlist.

Usage with Examples

The following examples demonstrate ffuf’s versatility for various scenarios:

Discovering Directories

ffuf -w dirs.txt -u http://example.com/FUZZ

Output: List of found directories

Fuzzing File Extensions

ffuf -w files.txt -e .php -u http://example.com/FUZZ

Output: List of PHP files


It’s important to note that the specific outputs will vary depending on the respective web server’s content and configuration. Thus, the outputs listed above are meant for illustrative purposes.

Conclusive Summary

We’ve gone through the key features, installation steps, and multiple usage scenarios demonstrating ffuf’s power and versatility. By leveraging the examples provided, you can adapt ffuf to suit your particular web fuzzing needs and better secure your projects or networks. Remember to employ these techniques responsibly and ethically.

References