After taking a short break yesterday, I picked up where I left off today with my Claude Pro subscription, and I have to say... my day was quite successful. I was able to run Hive-specific security audits and report several critical security vulnerabilities to the developers involved. In total, I’ve already put 7 hours of investigative work into the day. I was able to report everything from minor, harmless misconfigurations to leaked credentials. Among other things, leaked credentials (login information stored in a location where it shouldn’t be) allowed me to perform certain actions that could lead to far-reaching security issues within the Hive ecosystem. Throughout the day, I also learned a lot more about IT security and vulnerabilities myself, which I can apply even better and more deeply in future security investigations.
The topic of artificial intelligence and how quickly it can identify reports and security vulnerabilities is truly alarming, but also increasingly time-consuming. On the one hand, AI really does take a lot of work off your hands and suggests ways a potential security vulnerability could be exploited—but on the other hand, I end up sitting here for hours working on proof-of-concepts, having them double-checked, and then having to test them more and more in the real world. What saves time on one hand ends up being a lot more work on the other... And I’m glad I can help here—making the HIVE ecosystem and its applications more secure—but today I briefly reached a point where it was really exhausting. Because with some bugs and security vulnerabilities, you can’t just slap the PoC code on top of it, but also have to think two or three steps ahead within the HIVE ecosystem here and there—to determine whether what you’ve found is truly exploitable.
Hobby or a Job?
I'm not sure where I stand right now—is what I'm doing (security analysis and bug reporting) more of a hobby, or is it starting to feel like a 9-to-5 job? To be honest, it feels more and more like a job—hunting for bugs, reporting and fixing them, and being constantly available—the pressure to find the next bug quickly, otherwise the next hacker group will exploit it... With the thought in my head that I’ve already reported hundreds of bugs and security vulnerabilities to the community, it’s pushing me more and more toward it being a job rather than just a hobby or side project. It’s captivating—continuing to learn—watching videos by NetworkChuck and NahamSec on YouTube fascinates me and drives me even further—Am I on the verge of burnout? No, I don’t think so yet... But it also needs structure—Life goes on—The real world is still there and wants to experience things with me, too.
Sorry, I just wanted to get that off my chest for today.