My Modern Bug Bounty Toolkit: Exploit Development & Scanning

Bug bounty hunting is a race against time and other researchers. To find vulnerabilities before anyone else, you need a workflow that is fast, automated, and deep.

In this article, I will share the exact toolchain I use for modern reconnaissance, vulnerability scanning, and local exploit development.

The Hacking Workflow

A structured bug bounty pipeline consists of four major stages:

flowchart LR
    A[Reconnaissance] --> B[Subdomain Enumeration]
    B --> C[Active Port & Service Scan]
    C --> D[Targeted Vulnerability Testing]

1. Reconnaissance & Asset Discovery

Recon is the foundation of any bug bounty methodology. If you find an asset that everyone else missed, you’ll find vulnerabilities that everyone else missed.

Subfinder

Developed by ProjectDiscovery, Subfinder is a fast subdomain discovery tool that queries passive sources.

subfinder -d target.com -o subdomains.txt

Amass

OWASP’s Amass uses active and passive techniques, including DNS scraping, archive searches, and API integration, to build an in-depth map of target attack surfaces.

amass enum -active -d target.com -o amass_subs.txt

2. Port Scanning & Service Probe

Once subdomains are mapped, you need to identify what services are running.

Naabu

Naabu is a fast port scanner written in Go, designed to scan thousands of hosts quickly and reliably.

naabu -list subdomains.txt -c 50 -rate 1000 -o ports.txt

HTTPX

HTTPX is a multipurpose HTTP toolkit that resolves subdomains, checks headers, determines technologies used (Wappalyzer integration), and extracts title tags.

httpx -l ports.txt -title -status-code -tech-detect -o live_web.txt

3. Targeted Vulnerability Scanning

I avoid generic, heavy scanners. Instead, I use template-based scanners to target specific vulnerabilities.

Nuclei

Nuclei allows sending requests across targets using YAML-based templates. This is perfect for scanning for specific zero-days or configuration errors instantly.

nuclei -l live_web.txt -t cves/ -severity critical,high -o vulnerabilities.txt

[!TIP] Keep your Nuclei templates updated. You can run nuclei -update-templates to pull the latest community-contributed templates.

4. Exploit Development & Interception

For local analysis, reversing, and manual exploit payload crafting:

Burp Suite Professional

The absolute gold standard for web application pentesting. Its repeater, intruder, and custom BChecks make intercepting and manipulating HTTP traffic extremely efficient.

Ghidra

A software reverse-engineering suite created by the NSA. Perfect for analyzing binaries, decompiling buffer overflows, and searching for logic bugs in desktop apps.

Summary Table

Tool	Focus	Language	Strengths
Subfinder	Subdomain discovery	Go	Extremely fast passive discovery
Amass	Attack surface mapping	Go	Massive data source integration
Naabu	Port scanning	Go	High-performance raw socket scanning
HTTPX	Web server probing	Go	Header and technology analysis
Nuclei	Vulnerability scanning	Go	YAML templates, highly customizable
Burp Suite	Traffic interception	Java	Best-in-class proxy, repeater & macros

By chaining these tools together with simple shell scripts, you can build a highly automated reconnaissance loop that flags vulnerabilities the second a target deploys new code.