Web recon

02A clue is a filename you can point to

An HTML comment is text between <!-- and --> that the browser normally does not display as page content. A link’s href gives the address it offers. On this page, both the comment and link name notes.txt. Copy the exact filename and its source line so another reader can find your evidence.

The supplied robots.txt mentions /draft/, but no draft file is supplied and the scope does not permit guessing paths. Treat the name as a clue in the file, not confirmation that a resource exists. Even a readable note is not automatically a vulnerability: a finding needs a policy or security boundary and evidence that it failed.

1User-agent: *
2Disallow: /example/
3User-agent selects crawlers; * means all in this group.
4Disallow asks those crawlers to avoid the matching path.
5The file supplies neither a tester’s identity nor a test grant.

03Read the three owned files

Read the three printed files as the whole corpus. You do not need to host them, follow external links or guess additional addresses.

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
  <meta charset="utf-8">
  <title>Owned desk</title>
</head>
<body>
  <h1>Owned desk</h1>
  <p>Read the files in this folder. Do not guess other paths.</p>
  <!-- spare list: notes.txt -->
  <p><a href="notes.txt">Spare list</a></p>
</body>
</html>

User-agent: *
Disallow: /draft/

The spare list is this file.
A filename is a clue.
It is not a grant, and it is not a finding.
There is no draft file in this folder.

1. Find notes.txt in the page’s comment and its link. Write both locations as supporting evidence for the filename.
2. Read the linked note. Record that the course published it intentionally and that a filename alone establishes no weakness.
3. Copy the Disallow path /draft/ into a separate crawler-rule line. Leave existence and access policy unconfirmed because neither is established by the supplied record.
4. Stop after those three observations. Do not request /draft/ or expand into directory guessing.

04Optional challenge

In about ten optional minutes, imagine that a later copy of the comment says old-notes.txt while the visible link still names notes.txt. Write the disagreement and identify which source supports each name. Your rubric is faithful evidence and uncertainty, with no claim that either file is vulnerable.

05Fresh cases for the checks

Use these fictional cases for the checks below. They have different inputs from the worked examples. Read them here or make notes; no installation or external service is needed.

index.html excerpt:
<!-- older draft: plan-v1.txt -->
<a href="plan-v2.txt">Current plan</a>
robots.txt excerpt:
User-agent: *
Disallow: /archive/
Grant: read the supplied index.html, robots.txt and plan-v2.txt text only.
No path is to be requested. plan-v1.txt is not supplied.

An authored page contains <!-- notes in shelf.txt -->.
No shelf.txt contents or network response are supplied.

06Explain your evidence

Optional written self-check: explain one decision using the supplied case. No tool run is required.

Check your explanation: cite the exact source of each clue; distinguish a crawler request from authorization; keep missing resource contents and existence unconfirmed.