I generated 16 character (upper/lower) subdomain and set up a virtual host for it in Apache, and within an hour was seeing vulnerability scans.
How are folks digging this up? What’s the strategy to avoid this?
I am serving it all with a single wildcard SSL cert, if that’s relevant.
Thanks
Edit:
- I am using a single wildcard cert, with no subdomains attached/embedded/however those work
- I don’t have any subdomains registered with DNS.
- I attempted dig axfr example.com @ns1.example.com returned zone transfer DENIED
Edit 2: I’m left wondering, is there an apache endpoint that returns all configured virtual hosts?
Edit 3: I’m going to go through this hardening guide and try against with a new random subdomain https://www.tecmint.com/apache-security-tips/


https://crt.sh/
When a CA issues an SSL/TLS certificate, they’re required to submit it to public CT logs (append-only, cryptographically verifiable ledgers). This was designed to detect misissued or malicious certificates.
Red and Blue team alike use this resource (crt.sh) to enumerate subdomains.
But this still doesn’t explain it. Like OP I also use a wildcard cert. The subdomains are never exposed.
TIL