This article provides a clear and concise walkthrough of the “Emdee five for life” challenge from Hack The Box. The challenge, while categorized as easy, presents a fun little hurdle: you need to be faster than a human to solve it. The core task is to take a string provided by a web page, encrypt it using the MD5 algorithm, and submit it back, all before the server times you out.
HackTheBox Emdee five for life Description
Can you encrypt fast enough?
Tools Used
requests: handle HTTP GET/POST
re: extract target string via regex
hashlib: compute MD5 hashes
sys, cmd: input URL and exit gracefully (supportive)
Walkthrough
Manual submission is futile, as the server will almost instantly tell you you’re “too slow.” This is a classic sign that automation is not just helpful but mandatory.
For those who enjoy crafting their own solutions, you can build a Python script using the requests and BeautifulSoup libraries. This method offers precision and a deep understanding of the automation process.
Full Writeup
Full write-up can be found here.