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But before that,

you might be a little bit confused and you might be wondering what exactly is a reverse shell and what it can do.

Let’s get started.

What is a shell?

A shell is a computer program or a piece of software that sits between user and Unix like operating systems. In simple words shell acts as an interface between user and the kernel which is heart of an operating system.

Scripts, programs and comments can be written in the shell. That is the only way to access a kernel of an operating system.

Examples of shell are sh, csh and bash shells.

What is a remote shell?

A remote shell is a command-line program that allows you to run shell commands on a different computer over a network.

What is a bind shell and Reverse shell?

In bind shell, the attacker connects to the listener, which is running on the target already, to gain a remote shell. However, bind shells have a major security flaw that anyone can connect to it and run commands because it waits for an incoming connection all the time. So blind shells can easily be exploited by a malicious attacker.

Instead what if we had our target connect to us. That’s what exactly is reverse shell.

example – when the target wants to visit some website the firewall’s like yeah man

come on through you’re good you’re

trusted you’re coming from inside the

so if we could get our target to connect

that connection shouldn’t be blocked

The main goal of reversal shell is to connect to and control a target computer from anywhere in the world.

How to create reverse shells with netcat in linux? Uncategorized

Use of reverse shell

this is for educational purposes only you do not have permission to hack anyone for any reason so just don’t do it but i do want you to try this on yourself i want you to try it on your own home network why well because it’s fun and it’s also a skill that you nee if you want to become an ethical hacker a pen tester

What is Netcat?

The swiss army knife of networking

Netcat really shows its brilliance when it comes down to transferring data between client and server.

Note: Netcat is not installed by default on a Windows machine, so if your target system is a Windows machine, you will need to download it manually in the target system first.

More Reverse Shells

For an impressive list of reverse shell payloads, you can refer to the Reverse Shell Cheat Sheet on GitHub.


Learn how to to add, modify and remove user in Linux here.