Welcome back, my novice hackers! This next subject might seem a bit obscure, but I promise you, this lesson will benefit you significantly either as a hacker or system admin. This tutorial will cover what is usually referred to as a regular expression, or regex for short. Ma ...more
Surveillance is always a useful tool in a hacker's arsenal, whether deployed offensively or defensively. Watching targets yourself isn't always practical, and traditional surveillance camera systems can be costly, lacking in capabilities, or both. Today, we will use motionEyeO ...more
Screenshots taken from a compromised computer can provide hackers with access to private emails, photographs, and information found in sensitive documents. This data can be used by the attackers to build profiles of a target for social engineering attacks and blackmail or even ...more
No website will be inaccessible and no web filter will deny you content once you learn the skills presented in this internet hacking video. In this tutorial you'll learn how to access blocked websites as well as to bypass web filters using URL scripting, HTTP proxies, and a w ...more
It's not uncommon for hackers to attempt to move laterally between devices in proximity of a compromised device to maintain a prolonged presence in the network. Malware utilizing USB flash sticks to self-replicate and compromise air-gapped machines isn't a new concept. In bot ...more
Without admin privileges, installing additional software, or modifying the Windows 10 firewall, an attacker can alter a router and perform a variety of exploits. It's accomplished by forwarding requests from Kali through a backdoored Windows computer to the router gateway with ...more
You wouldn't send your GPS coordinates to a completely random stranger just because he or she asked you for it, right? So why are you constantly sharing your location (and other data) to apps on a daily basis? While there are many apps that need your location in order to func ...more
When it comes to attacking devices on a network, you can't hit what you can't see. Nmap gives you the ability to explore any devices connected to a network, finding information like the operating system a device is running and which applications are listening on open ports. Th ...more
Welcome back, my novice hackers! Reconnaissance is one of the most important preparatory steps to hacking. As I have emphasized many times before here on Null Byte, you must know the operating system, the ports, the services, the applications, and sometimes even the language ...more
Welcome back, my rookie hackers! When Wi-Fi was first developed and popularized in the late '90s, security was not a major concern. Unlike wired connections, anyone could simply connect to a Wi-Fi access point (AP) and steal bandwidth, or worse—sniff the traffic. The first a ...more
Five Phases of Hacking:- The five phases of Hacking are as follow: Reconnaissance Scanning Gaining Access Maintaining Access Covering Tracks The Five Phases of Hacking Reconnaissance:- This is the primary phase where the Hacker tries to collect as much information as possib ...more
Welcome back, my novice hackers! In a recent tutorial, I showed how the SNMP protocol can be a gold mine of information for reconnaissance on a potential target. If you haven't already, I strongly suggest that you read it before progressing here, as little of this will make m ...more
In part one of this tutorial we found out that your English teacher is a paedophile, by using a Man in the Middle attack to intercept his internet traffic. Now you're faced with the dilemma of how to alert other staff at the school to how creepy he is without letting on that ...more
Welcome back, my budding hackers! Recently, I showed you how you could exploit the widely disseminated OpenSSL vulnerability that has to become known as "Heartbleed". Although the world has known about this vulnerability for over a month now, it will likely take many more mon ...more
One of Android's most glaring weaknesses is its lack of an iMessage equivalent. That is, of course, until now. There's one app that will allow Android users to experience iMessage on their non-Apple phone, complete with end-to-end encryption, message effects, and group messagi ...more
Welcome back, my novice hackers! New hackers often ask me the same question: "What is the easiest platform to hack?" My response is always the same—it is not a platform, but rather a particular piece of software that is easiest to hack, which is on nearly every client-side sy ...more
Popping a shell is often the main goal of a hacker, and it can be exciting when executed properly, but sometimes they do have their limitations. Metasploit's Meterpreter probably needs no introduction, but this powerful, dynamic payload can offer a leg up over normal shells. T ...more
Coinhive, a JavaScript cryptocurrency miner, was reportedly discovered on the BlackBerry Mobile website. It was placed there by hackers who exploited a vulnerability in the site's e-commerce software that allowed them to anonymously mine cryptocurrency every time the website w ...more
Passwords stored in web browsers like Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox are a gold mine for hackers. An attacker with backdoor access to a compromised computer can easily dump and decrypt data stored in web browsers. So, you'll want to think twice before hitting "Save" next ti ...more
When hacking into a network during a penetration test, it can sometimes be useful to create your own wireless AP simply by plugging a Pi into an available Ethernet port. With this setup, you have your own backdoor wireless connection to the network in a matter of seconds. Crea ...more
Shodan calls itself "the search engine for internet-connected devices." With so many devices connected to the internet featuring varying levels of security, the special capabilities of this search engine mean it can provide a list of devices to test and attack. In this tutoria ...more
Welcome back, my nascent Hackers! In my last blog, we looked at a passive way to gather information necessary for a hack. The advantage of using passive recon is that it's totally undetectable, meaning that the target never knows you're scouting them and you leave no tracks. ...more
For the most part, Google Wifi and Nest Wifi systems take care of themselves. But there are still a few manual features that might come in handy, like being able to check on network activity to see which devices are using the most bandwidth when your connection gets bogged dow ...more
Welcome back, my hacker noviates! In a recent post, I introduced you to Shodan, the world's most dangerous search engine. Shodan crawls the globe from IP to IP address, attempting to pull the banners of each web-enabled device and server it finds. These banners are what the ...more
Web applications are becoming more and more popular, replacing traditional desktop programs at an accelerated rate. With all these new apps out on the web comes various security implications associated with being connected to the internet where anyone can poke and prod at them ...more
Hackers are always seeking zero-day exploits that can successfully bypass Windows 10's security features. There has been extensive research into creating undetectable malware and entire GitHub projects dedicated to automating the creation of undetectable payloads such as WinPa ...more
Sometimes you need a password to gain access to an older running Windows system. Maybe it's a machine in your basement you forgot about or a locked machine that belonged to a disgruntled employee. Maybe you just want to try out your pentesting skills. When you need to access ...more
Welcome back, my novice hackers! In this third installment of my Hacking Web Apps series, we will look at the authentication of web applications. Remember, there are many ways to hack web applications (as I pointed out in my first article), and cracking authentication is just ...more
Now that we have our payload hosted on our VPS, as well as Metasploit installed, we can begin developing the webpage which will trick our "John Smith" target into opening our malicious file. Once he has, we can take over his computer. This part is more involved, but the first ...more
Things that are supposed to make life easier for developers and users are often easy targets for exploitation by hackers. Like many situations in the tech world, there is usually a trade-off between convenience and security. One such trade-off is found in a system known as Dis ...more
Apple's Gatekeeper security software for macOS (Mac OS X) is vulnerable to remote attacks up to version 10.14.5. An attacker that's anywhere in the world can exploit MacBooks and other Mac computers by sharing a single ZIP file. The vulnerability was discovered by Filippo Cav ...more
Welcome back, my novice hackers! This is the third installment of my Python scripting series. If you haven't read the previous two articles, take some time now to go back and read Part 1 and Part 2 before you proceed here. As I mentioned in previous tutorials, Python is prob ...more
WPA Enterprise is widely used in large corporations as it offers individual and centralized control through a server that authenticate the users (RADIUS server). In this tutorial I will show you how to break the barrier and obtain the user credentials. How It Works? Let's ha ...more
Welcome back, my rookie hackers! So many readers come to Null Byte to learn how to hack Wi-Fi networks (this is the most popular hacking area on Null Byte) that I thought I should write a "how-to" on selecting a good Wi-Fi hacking strategy. Many beginners come here looking t ...more
School internet filters serve a valid purpose—they keep students from wandering off into the deep corners of the web while still allowing at least some internet access. But a lot of these restrictions are completely ridiculous, to the point where some school districts block ac ...more
Imagine this scenario: You exploited a system using metasploit and you want to install a backdoor. You have a few options; Use the meterpreter persistence command. Use the meterpreter metsvc command. Use netcat to listen on a port continuously. You have already tried option ...more
Locating and abusing files containing unsafe permissions is an easy and surefire way to elevate shell privileges on a backdoored macOS device. This time around, we'll be more aggressive and attempt to phish a user's login password by prompting a convincing popup message merely ...more
Most of us skip through documents like privacy policies and EULAs (end-user license agreements) because they're long and boring. But, as Congress just passed the SJR34 bill in early April, you're probably a little concerned about your personal data, so we summarized the privac ...more
Being able to write your own hacking tools is what separates the script kiddies from the legendary hackers. While this can take many forms, one of the most coveted skills in hacking is the ability to dig through the binary files of a program and identify vulnerabilities at the ...more
In the 21st century, we're all looking for ways to stay private, especially on our electronic devices. We have big tech corporations, enemy countries, malicious hackers, and other prying eyes watching our every move, so it's only natural to want to limit what they can see. Mak ...more
The Windows 10 desktop and microphone can be livestreamed without using Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) software and without opening any ports on the target computer. A hacker with low user privileges can monitor and exfiltrate a target's every move and private conversation in r ...more
UnrealIRCd is an open-source IRC server that has been around since 1999 and is perhaps the most widely used one today. Version 3.2.8.1 was vulnerable to remote code execution due to a backdoor in the software. Today, we will be exploiting the vulnerability with Metasploit, exa ...more
Greetings My Fellow Aspiring Hackers, Its been long since I last posted a tutorial. Its vacation and since I won't be coming home, I've decided to use my day for sharing. I was browsing through old posts and found OTW's article - Hack Like A Pro: How to Find the Exact Locatio ...more
Game streaming has never been better. Not only can you watch your favorite Twitch streamer play, but with the new tools being added to YouTube, you can even play along with them. And now, with a solid internet connection, you can stream your Xbox One games to your phone to enj ...more
If you have friends who aren't privacy-conscious, you've surely heard the old "What do I have to hide?" excuse. Despite the fact that billions of people are using the internet each day, many of them don't know the dangers that can find them. And many don't know the tools to co ...more
It's easier than you might think to hack into Wi-Fi routers using just one unrooted Android phone. This method doesn't require brute-forcing the password, a Windows OS for converting PowerShell scripts into EXE format, a reliable VPS for intercepting hacked Wi-Fi passwords, or ...more
It's exciting to get that reverse shell or execute a payload, but sometimes these things don't work as expected when there are certain defenses in play. One way to get around that issue is by obfuscating the payload, and encoding it using different techniques will usually brin ...more
Using Hydra, Ncrack, and other brute-forcing tools to crack passwords for the first time can be frustrating and confusing. To ease into the process, let's discuss automating and optimizing brute-force attacks for potentially vulnerable services such as SMTP, SSH, IMAP, and FTP ...more
The latest Star Wars movie, Solo: A Star Wars Story, has grossed almost $350 million worldwide during its first month in theaters. This is a good opportunity to discuss how hackers can use media hype (in this case, Hollywood movie hype) to disarm an unsuspecting Windows user i ...more
People have asked: "Here is an IP address. Can you hack this? Can you hack me right now?" Hacking takes time and skill. You can't just get an IP or an email and hack it in ten minutes unless the password is 1234. I say, "No. I can't really do what you want me to do like this ...more
Leaked databases get passed around the internet and no one seems to notice. We've become desensitized to the data breaches that occur on a daily basis because it happens so frequently. Join me as I illustrate why reusing passwords across multiple websites is a truly awful prac ...more
It's always a good idea to know how an attack works at the very basic level. Manual techniques for exploitation often find holes that even the most sophisticated tool cannot. Sometimes, though, using one of these tools can make things so much easier, especially if one has a so ...more
Hackers rely on good data to be able to pull off an attack, and reconnaissance is the stage of the hack in which they must learn as much as they can to devise a plan of action. Technical details are a critical component of this picture, and with OSINT tools like Maltego, a sin ...more
ARP spoofing is an attack against an Ethernet or Wi-Fi network to get between the router and the target user. In an ARP-spoofing attack, messages meant for the target are sent to the attacker instead, allowing the attacker to spy on, deny service to, or man-in-the-middle a tar ...more
While hackers have taken advantage of numerous vulnerabilities in Adobe's products to deliver payloads to Windows users via PDF files, a malicious PDF file can also wreak havoc on a Mac that's using the default Preview app. So think twice before double-clicking a PDF open on y ...more
I've been a diehard Chrome user since its inception, and even more so since Android was released. The ability to sync bookmarks, passwords, and web history across all of my devices made the switch a no-brainer, but what really made me fall in love was the amount of extensions ...more
When joining a new network, computers use the Address Resolution Protocol to discover the MAC address of other devices on the same network. A hacker can take advantage of ARP messages to silently discover the MAC and IP address of network devices or actively scan the network w ...more
Computers all over the world rely on a program called "libssh" to use the SSH communications protocol, which allows trusted users to log in and administer computers remotely. Due to a flaw in libssh, fooling a computer into granting SSH access is as easy as telling it you alre ...more
Virtual private networks, or VPNs, are popular for helping you stay anonymous online by changing your IP address, encrypting traffic, and hiding your location. However, common IoT devices, media players, and smart TVs are hard to connect to a VPN, but we have a solution: Turn ...more
You may not know it, but the IPv4 address of your computer contains tons of useful information about whatever Wi-Fi network you're on. By knowing what your IPv4 address and subnet mask are telling you, you can easily scan the whole network range, locate the router, and discove ...more