academy.security.krd

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Two clocks disagree

Medium · 20 points

A file's own timestamps, and the firewall record of the session that supposedly created it.

The file claims to have been written before the connection that delivered it existed. One of these sources has been tampered with, and the filesystem keeps more than one timestamp for a reason.

Find the field that proves the visible write time was altered, and submit its name as the flag: skrd{field}.

Malware routinely rewrites the timestamp a file browser shows. It rarely bothers with the one only the filesystem updates.

Artefact

-- file metadata, host ws-031 -----------------------------------
  path              C:\Users\Public\svc-update.tmp
  Modified (M)      2026-02-03T09:14:02Z
  Accessed (A)      2026-02-03T09:14:02Z
  Created   (B)     2026-02-03T09:14:02Z
  MFT changed (C)   2026-03-11T02:48:19Z

-- firewall session log ------------------------------------------
  2026-03-11T02:47:55Z  ws-031 -> 203.0.113.44:443  established
  2026-03-11T02:48:31Z  ws-031 -> 203.0.113.44:443  1.4MB out
  2026-03-11T02:51:02Z  ws-031 -> 203.0.113.44:443  closed
Hint

Three timestamps agree to the second and sit a month before the session. The fourth does not, and it is the one an attacker cannot set from user space.