An XSS Channel is an interactive communication channel between two systems which is opened by an XSS attack. At a technical level, it is a type of AJAX application which can obtain commands, send responses back and is able to talk cross-domain.

The XSS Shell is a tool that can be used to setup an XSS Channel between a victim and an attacker so that an attacker to control a victim’s browser by sending it commands. This communication is bi-directional.


To get the XSS Shell to work an attacker needs to inject the XSS Shell’s JavaScript reference by way of an XSS attack. The attacker is then able to control the victim’s browser. After this point the attacker can see requests, responses and is able to instruct the victim’s browser to carryout requests.

Download the article in PDF format here.