Welcome back, aspiring cyberwarriors and OSINT investigators!

During the OSINT investigation, we might find a situation where a target has a presence on the Discord platform. According to Demadsage, there are 259 million monthly active users on Discord. Therefore, leaving this source of intelligence would be unwise. But unlike regular social media, Discord’s data is kept in semi-private “servers,” so investigators have to engage actively and correlate the data rather than just observe through third-party tools. And this requires more investment in tools and awareness of visibility risks.

Therefore, in this article, we will explore the first steps to get started with OSINT on Discord users. Let’s get rolling!

Step #1: Search Architecture

Discord has powerful built-in search, which acts like a localized “Dorking” system. To get started using it, we just need to click on the top-right search form. As you can see below, it has 4 core operators for filtering.

Besides that, Discord offers 3 more filters after clicking “More filters”.

This built-in search serves as a good start for investigation. Just by writing a good query, you can sort through tens of thousands of messages. And sometimes, even find leaked access credentials.

Another important thing here is the images. Sometimes folks shared photos from their college graduation years ago or a first-day-on-the-job photo. Or even some family photos. Therefore, even with simple search filters, a lot of interesting data can be found.

Step #2: Linked Accounts

One of the easiest ways to find the real name of a Discord user is to look into linked accounts. Originally, Discord was built for gamers, and these linked accounts were intended to share in-game status and activities. But eventually, the list of supported services grew very long, and now users can connect their Facebook, GitHub, and even PayPal accounts.

In the screen above, we can see a list of services and a YouTube channel, which appears to be a real name.

Step #3: Server Nicknames

In Discord, every user can create a different username for every server they join.

This is useful because users might set up their real names or provide additional information for the investigation on other servers. To check it, just click “View full profile” and then the three dots.

Step #4: Discord ID

A Discord ID is a unique 18-digit number, and everyone has one. Users, messages, servers, and even bots all have one. The advantage of this is that while a username can be changed, a user’s ID cannot. Discord, in turn, uses these IDs to store all user data, including the history of name changes.

To find a Discord ID, all we need to do is enable developer mode. To do this, click the gear icon next to your name (in the lower-right corner), and in the settings menu that opens, look for the “Developer” section. There, enable “Developer Mode.”

Now find the user you’re looking for and click on their name. An actions menu will open; you’ll see three dots. Click on them, and you’ll see the “Copy User ID” button.

Step #5: Cord.Cat Tool

After gathering the user’s ID, we can move into the usage of dedicated tools for Discord OSINT. One of them is the Cord.cat website. The core function of Cord.cat is resolving a Discord “snowflake” (the numeric user ID) into a complete, sourced picture of the account. But beyond basic profile data, the platform checks for breaches, FiveM records, and DSA sanctions. To get started, we just need to enter the user’s ID on the website. You will see output like below.

Here we can see that this account wasn’t found in breaches; there are no sanctions, etc. On the left, we can see the account creation date and links to download the avatar, decorations, and nameplate. By scrolling below, we can see more info.

We can see that the user has a low risk score according to the assessment. If we scroll down, we can see additional information like this.

We can see servers where this user is joined, and we can see whether this ID has an account on Discord-related websites.

Summary

Discord has huge potential for OSINT. Especially if we look into it not just as a communications channel for gamers, but as a tool for a wide range of people, where there are even cases when companies use this tool for employee communications. Although it has semi-private servers, with the correct approach, this social platform can provide good intelligence.

If you’re looking to enhance your OSINT skills, consider exploring OSINT training. If you need assistance in uncovering the truth, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at hackers-arise@protonmail.com, and we’ll conduct a comprehensive OSINT investigation for you.

The post Open Source Intelligence (OSINT): Gathering Information on Discord Users first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, investigators!

Some things just lie on the surface, while others take time to find. In OSINT, finding the right data often means digging deep. Before you reach a conclusion, there must be solid evidence to support it, and data acquisition is always the most time consuming part of this process. The success of your investigation depends on how well you can find information and connect the dots.

OpenPlanter can automate part of this process. 

OpenPlanter

Essentially, OpenPlanter is a recursive language model investigation agent. It ingests different kinds of data, which can be corporate registries, campaign finance records, government contracts and more. It then resolves entities across them and surfaces connections through evidence-based analysis. You can also use it to build profiles of individuals based on publicly available information.

OpenPlanter has both a desktop GUI and a terminal interface. The second one is more convenient.

Setting Up

The setup process is quick. We just need to create a Python environment that will host the needed libraries. 

kali > git clone https://github.com/ShinMegamiBoson/OpenPlanter.git
kali > cd OpenPlanter
kali > python3 -m venv venv; source venv/bin/activate
kali > pip install -e . 

Once it’s done, we need to give it our API keys. 

To make web searches, OpenPlanter needs the Exa API. Exa is cheap to use and gives free credits for new accounts, so you don’t have to pay upfront. OpenRouter API is also needed to run the tool. OpenRouter has free AI models, but there is a daily usage limit. Make an account there and get your free API key. 

To configure keys, run this command and paste them: 

kali > openplanter-agent --configure-keys

At this point, you can use the tool.

Using OpenPlanter with OpenRouter

The daily API usage limit is enough to run a couple of basic tests, like the one below.

kali > openplanter-agent --task “Find recent security breaches affecting Apple” --provider openrouter --model openrouter/free

OpenPlanter will use Exa API key to find information. Without Exa, it burns tokens faster and gives incomplete results. 

Normally, the tool saves the results in a text file in the current directory, but it doesn’t always happen. Be careful and make sure you don’t lose anything. 

Here is our first report.

To make things more interesting, we asked it to find a complete list of Tatneft executives. Tatneft is one of the largest oil and gas companies in Russia.

The report was well organized, but all this information is readily available on the internet, due to the size of the Russian company. 

When it was asked to find more information on a specific person from the list above, it struggled to find much and ended up with some generic data and a wrong social media account. Well, maybe that person is hard to find, so we gave it a second chance and picked a unique name from the same list: Nail Ulfatovich Maganov.

kali > openplanter-agent --task "Find as much information as you can on Nail Ulfatovich Maganov who works at Tatneft. If possible, find his Vkontakte, phone number, address, email and check if his email has been in data leaks. Save the results in a text file" --provider openrouter --model openrouter/free

The results can be seen below. OpenPlanter did find his LinkedIn account and extracted information from various places. 

It also found OpenSanctions records associated with Nail Maganov. 

But he is a well known figure in Russia. What about regular employees at a large Russian company? We will use Sibur for this example. Founded in 1995, it’s Russia’s largest petrochemical company.

We tried two individuals. During the first attempt, the tool didn’t find the correct person. After the second attempt with a different employee, it gave the results. 

It found Svetlana’s position (Head of HR). This information was in her LinkedIn account. The rest of the information deserves further validation. Keep in mind, Russia has undergone a massive data blackout, systematically dismantling its open data and public statistics infrastructure. No wonder it’s hard to find things there.

Using OpenPlanter with Ollama – Locally

OpenPlanter’s own docs push toward frontier models (GPT-5.2, Claude Opus 4.6, Cerebras Qwen3-235B), because the whole process is quite demanding. Small local models will be noticeably weaker. But we still gave it a try. The first model was Qwen3:0.6B and its first attempt didn’t produce any results. After the second attempt, it found recent vulnerabilities that Windows had.

We also tried it with Qwen3:4b, but it produced absolutely irrelevant data in its response. 

We didn’t stop here and tried it again. The results were still irrelevant. Instead of making a report on Mikhail Karisalov (CEO of Sibur) it spoke about something else. 

Using OpenPlanter with Ollama – Remote Servers

If you decide to rent a server with good hardware to test other models, don’t waste your time on it. We tried various models, but none of them worked well. OpenPlanter calls a model, the model replies and then it fails. The output can be seen on the screen.

Here is an example with Qwen3.6:27b. Qwen3.6:35b had the same issue.

We also tried Ornith:35B.

These models support thinking and tooling, but they can’t really do much in this case. 

Terminal Interface

It’s also important to mention that there are two ways you can use OpenPlanter in the terminal. So far, you’ve seen only one. If you’re more comfortable with a chat interface, you can use the second option.

kali > openplanter-agent --provider openrouter --model openrouter/free

Here you run your prompts and tweak the tool using the available commands.

Summary

After testing the tool in various ways, we came to the conclusion that it works reliably only with OpenRouter. That’s what gave us the best results. The developers also push towards frontier models or OpenRouter. The whole process of investigation relies heavily on the Exa API. Using it with Ollama models hosted externally (VPS) will not work, as it fails silently even if you select a supported AI model. 

The tool might confuse people, especially if their names are common and their social media profiles are empty. Everything it finds deserves validation. Occasionally, it may check the results, marking them HIGH, MEDIUM or LOW depending on its confidence. It doesn’t always do it, but this can be fixed if the prompt explicitly asks for it. Most importantly, OpenPlanter can still save you time.

Learn more with our AI for Cybersecurity training. During the training, we’ll show you different ways of using AI in cybersecurity, set up local models and solve tasks with it.

The post Artificial Intelligence in Cybersecurity, Part 26: OpenPlanter for OSINT Investigations first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, aspiring cyberwarriors!

Imagine this: you need to keep tabs on a sketchy person who may be involved in fraud. You’ve got some info about them and access to a laptop, ready to dive into your investigation. But as you start digging, you realize your system is missing the right tools for an OSINT investigation. Sure, you could set everything up on Kali Linux or Parrot OS, but that could take hours.

That’s where Tsurugi Linux comes in. In this article, we’ll break down what Tsurugi Linux is, how to get it installed, and what cool features it brings to the table for OSINT investigations. Let’s get rolling!

What is Tsurugi Linux

Many newcomers to open-source intelligence often turn to Kali Linux or Parrot OS as their first specialized distributions, and both are effective tools. However, neither was specifically designed for OSINT purposes. Kali Linux, for instance, is primarily an offensive penetration-testing platform. While it includes some OSINT utilities, its main focus is on exploitation rather than investigation. This is where Tsurugi Linux comes in.

Tsurugi Linux is a free and open-source Linux distribution specifically tailored for incident response and OSINT investigations. Its name, inspired by a Japanese double-bladed sword, reflects its dual emphasis on active intelligence gathering and passive forensic analysis. Tsurugi addresses the challenge of consolidating and curating over 300 specialized tools, thereby saving users the tedious process of installing and configuring each tool individually on a generic system. Instead, Tsurugi provides a pre-packaged, user-friendly environment organized by investigative categories, allowing users to become productive in just hours rather than days.

The Three Flavors of Tsurugi

Before downloading anything, it’s important to understand that Tsurugi is available in three distinct forms, each serving a specific purpose. Tsurugi Linux LAB is the full 64-bit distribution that we will focus on in this article. It includes the complete toolkit and is designed to be installed on a dedicated machine or run in a virtual machine for hands-on analysis and OSINT investigation.

Tsurugi Acquire is a lighter 32-bit version that contains only the essential tools needed for live disk acquisition.

Finally, BENTO is a portable forensics toolkit that you can carry with you and run directly from a USB device, allowing you to conduct live investigations on machines that cannot be taken away.

For getting started purposes, Tsurugi Linux LAB is your target, and you can find the latest ISO image on the official project website at tsurugi-linux.org.

How to Install Tsurugi Linux

In this demonstration, I will install Tsurugi Linux on VirtualBox. To get started, we need to download the latest ISO image from the website and create a new virtual machine based on it.

It is recommended to allocate at least 4 gigabytes of RAM and 60 gigabytes of disk space during the creation process. Once this is done, you can boot the machine. A desktop like the one shown below will welcome you.

First Look

When you boot for the first time, you will see the MATE desktop environment. The taskbar at the top offers quick access to files, an application launcher, a web browser, and a terminal emulator named Terminator.

When you open the Applications menu, you will notice a typical range of categories. Like most distributions, it includes programs for internet browsing, programming, office tasks, various media players, and other standard software that is unlikely to surprise anyone. However, our main focus is on the first item in the menu, labeled TSURUGI.

The top-level categories include OSINT, Memory Forensics, Malware Analysis, Network Analysis, and others. We will not delve into specific tools here; some have been covered in previous articles, and we will address others that haven’t been discussed yet, provided they warrant our attention.

The Tsurugi Browser

Tsurugi Linux ships with a well-known version of the Firefox browser, preinstalled with extensions.

Let’s take a look at some of them.

Tampermonkey is a browser extension that enhances your browsing experience by allowing you to run userscripts on websites. Userscripts are small programs that modify page layouts, add or remove features, and automate actions to personalize your web experience.

DNSlytics lets you retrieve information about a domain, including WHOIS data, DNS records, and more.

NoScript is a browser extension that enhances online security and privacy by blocking JavaScript, Flash, Java, and other potentially harmful content on websites, only allowing execution from sites you explicitly trust.

Additional Features of Tsurugi Linux

The developers of Tsurugi Linux have worked hard to ensure that the operating system is as versatile as possible, making it suitable for a wide range of situations. To achieve this, they have included a vast array of utilities. Notably, they have highlighted OSINT (Open Source Intelligence) as a distinct category that has received special attention.

A dedicated OSINT profile has been introduced, and you can activate it by selecting the OSINT Switcher on the desktop or in the menu. Once enabled, most sections unrelated to OSINT will be removed from the menu, leaving only the relevant options you might need. Additionally, the wallpaper will change to provide a visual indicator of the active profile, ensuring you won’t confuse it with others.

Another valuable feature is the Write Blocker. This is an extra layer of protection against any malicious activity. The external storage device, such as a USB flash drive, will only be accessible in “read-only” mode when connected. To enable writing, select the TSURUGI device unlocker on the desktop. Then, in the window that opens, select the desired device and click “Unlock.”

Summary

Tsurugi Linux is a great choice for beginners starting with OSINT or digital forensics. It provides a friendly and well-equipped environment. While it won’t make you an expert right away, it will help you learn OSINT more quickly.

If you’re looking to enhance your OSINT skills, consider exploring our OSINT training. If you need assistance in uncovering the truth, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at hackers-arise@protonmail.com, and we’ll conduct a comprehensive OSINT investigation for you.

The post Open Source Intelligence (OSINT): Is Tsurugi Linux the Most Powerful OS for OSINT? first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, cyberwarriors! 

You’ve probably seen people committing their env files to GitHub without noticing it. When you’re looking for a job as a coder, that mistake alone is significant enough to get you rejected if it happens during the technical portion. And if it ever happened to you, it’s happened to plenty of others too.

Today we’ll look at TruffleHog. It’s a tool that scans Git repositories and their full history for secrets that got committed by accident. It uses high entropy checks with custom regular expressions to catch strings that look like API keys, tokens, passwords and other sensitive data. You can point it at one repository or use a GitHub or GitLab API to hit a lot of projects in one go.

A developer can delete a key from the latest commit, but it will still live in Git’s past. With those credentials, you access services without making much noise.

Installation

First install git-dumper and TruffleHog. The Python package and the GitHub release are not the same, so pay attention to which one you’re on.

kali > pip3 install git-dumper  
kali > pip3 install trufflehog

We’ll use git-dumper when we find an exposed .git directory and then run TruffleHog against that dump. Leaked .git folders are still common.

Dump a Repository

Some servers leave the entire .git directory open. Below you can see a website where it was fully accessible.

Dump it by giving git-dumper the URL and a local folder for the files.

kali > git-dumper http://example.com/.git dump

Other websites block the directory listing but still serve some of the files.

Git-dumper can pull every object, commit and reference it can reach.

kali > git-dumper http://example.com/.git/  dump

Everything will be stored in the dump folder.

Analyzing the Repositories

Once the dump is on disk, run TruffleHog against it. By default it runs entropy-based matching. That can help, but it shouldn’t be the only mode you know. In our case, regex with entropy off gave us more results. 

kali > trufflehog --regex --entropy NO dump

In one of the files we found database credentials.

You can also install TruffleHog from the GitHub release and scan the filesystem directly:

kali > curl -sSfL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/trufflesecurity/trufflehog/main/scripts/install.sh | sh -s -- -b /usr/local/bin 

kali > trufflehog filesystem /home/kali/Documents/dump  

This build is fine for tuning your scans, but it often makes more noise and false positives, so just be aware of it.

Other Ways to Analyze Repositories

Depending on which build you’re using, try these flags to change what you get in the output.

Scan a repo for verified secrets:

kali > trufflehog git https://github.com/trufflesecurity/test_keys --results=verified,unknown

Verified means TruffleHog checked these finding live against the service API (AWS, GitHub and so on). Unknown is both high entropy and regex hits that it couldn’t confirm.

Same scan with JSON output:

kali > trufflehog git https://github.com/trufflesecurity/test_keys --results=verified,unknown --json

Scan a GitHub repo including issues and pull requests:

kali > trufflehog github --repo=https://github.com/trufflesecurity/test_keys --issue-comments --pr-comments  

That digs into issues, comments, PR bodies and comments. You can find leaks in discussions too.

Scan a local Git repo:

kali > trufflehog git file://test_keys --results=verified,unknown  

Useful when you’ve compromised a dev Linux machine with multiple projects on it. There’s a better chance of finding something locally than pushed to GitHub, although both can happen, as you now know.

Summary

We had an external pentest where several services were accessible but no credentials could be found. Surprisingly, some developers had kept projects they were doing for the company publicly accessible on GitHub. Eventually we found a working pair and got into a database.

TruffleHog can be really helpful here. Sensitive files sometimes get exposed without the publisher even knowing it. We’re humans and we make mistakes. Offensive or defensive, the point is the same.

The post Open Source Intelligence (OSINT): Finding Leaked Secrets with TruffleHog first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, aspiring investigators!

We recently updated our article on ShadowBroker, which a lot of you liked. The latest release brought some new features and made the dashboard even richer.

But ShadowBroker is resource intensive and might need you to allocate a good chunk of resources to your VM, which not all systems have. Instead, there’s Osiris and it can do similar things without any installation. You can run it in the browser or host it on your Kali. Both versions are identical.

Osiris

Osiris is a global intelligence dashboard that aggregates live flight tracking, CCTV, earthquake monitoring, conflict zone mapping and 24/7 news feeds. It’s made to give you situational awareness across multiple intelligence domains. The tool was built with Next.js 16 and MapLibre GL and every data point is rendered via WebGL for 60fps performance even with thousands of concurrent entities on screen.

Dashboard

Let’s start with the live version. It’s available here.

The world looks busy once you enable all the data layers on the left side of the screen.

Camera Feeds

There’s a huge number of cameras available around the world that are free to access. They are usually scattered across different websites and don’t look nearly as good as they do on a map. The dashboard has integrated a big number of them, marked with green dots on the map.

Here’s a camera in Toronto. Looks empty at 5 am.

Aircraft Tracking

All kinds of aircraft and maritime vehicles can be tracked. Not only that, you can do a deep dive on the intel available for each one. Below you can see we picked a random flight over the UAE and the dashboard pulled up the company it belongs to, Tim Clark who is the CEO and some publicly known information on him.

You can do similar things with other objects on the map.

So if you’re monitoring military activity in a certain region, that can come in handy.

Critical Infrastructure

There are different data assets you can display by clicking the database icon on the right side of the screen. The data is relevant for various places, but mostly for the US.

Above you can see the critical infrastructure in New York (red) and nationwide (yellow).

Conflicts and Dangerous Zones

Wars, tensions and threats are differentiated by color and notes are assigned to each with a severity level.

Market Analysis

When someone loses, someone else wins. Osiris can do some Market AI overview, which you obviously shouldn’t take as legit advice. But you can see it does some basic analysis and warns of potential price spikes.

Satellite Tracking

All kinds of satellites are available on the dashboard and they can also be tracked. Here you can see Starlink flying over the Atlantic and Canada.

Malware Threats

Finally, you can view malware threats and attacks on the map. There was a big node in China linked to a lot of attacks, with more scattered around the rest of the country.

Hosting Locally

Although the live version is stable and its uptime is good, you might still want to run it locally. It’s pretty easy to set up:

kali > sudo apt install npm
kali > git clone https://github.com/simplifaisoul/osiris.git
kali > cd osiris
kali > npm audit fix --force
kali > npm run dev

Then it’ll be available at http://localhost:3000

Summary

As you can see, there are different platforms available for different setups. Having compared the two, ShadowBroker looks richer and more professional, but Osiris hosts a live version you can use without any installation and it already has most of what you’d want to test. The installation itself is quick and easy and the dashboard consumes way fewer resources than ShadowBroker. Test it yourself and see what you like.

You can learn more with us! Get our Cybersecurity Starter Bundle II and unlock WiFi Hacking, Python for Hackers, Radio Basics and other training.

The post Open Source Intelligence (OSINT): Using Osiris for Global Intelligence first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, aspiring cyberwarriors!

Railways are probably the most talkative piece of infrastructure in the world. Unlike military installations or closed networks, most railway data is deliberately published in the open: timetables, track diagrams and network lengths. All of this exists to serve passengers, logistics companies, and researchers, but that same data turns out to be a powerful OSINT resource for transport infrastructure analysts and security researchers alike.

In this article, I will walk through a set of open tools that let you investigate the rail infrastructure of almost any country, from a static map of the tracks to the real-time position of a single train. Let’s get rolling!

Why This Matters

A rail network is the physical backbone of a country’s logistics, covering passenger traffic, freight corridors, border crossings, and industrial sidings. For an analyst, it is a source of information about the network’s topology, meaning which lines connect where, which stations act as junctions, and which branches simply end. It also reveals capacity and traffic load, since it shows how many trains actually run on a given route. Beyond that, it exposes concrete infrastructure objects such as stations, depots, marshalling yards, and industrial spur lines. Finally, it can show real-time dynamics, meaning where a specific train or tram happens to be right now.

Each tool described below covers a different slice of this picture. Together they form a fairly complete stack for railway OSINT.

Step 1: OpenRailwayMap

https://www.openrailwaymap.org

This is a derivative project of OpenStreetMap dedicated entirely to railway infrastructure. The map displays tracks broken down by electrification, gauge, and number of tracks, along with signaling equipment and speed limits through its Maxspeed layer. It also shows stations, platforms, depots, and switches, and includes an operations layer that reveals which operator a given section of track belongs to.

Step 2: NS International Station Maps

https://www.nsinternational.com/en/stations/station-maps-floor-plan

This is a catalog of floor plans for European railway stations. It is useful when you need to understand the internal layout of a specific hub, including platform positions, exits, and interchange points with other transport modes.

For an OSINT analyst, this is a natural complement to satellite imagery. A floor plan shows what you cannot see from above, such as platform numbering, service access points, and staff-only zones.

Step 3: geOps Mobility Portal

https://mobility.portal.geops.io

This is an online tracker that shows the live movement of trains and public transport across most of Europe, tied to the published timetable. On the map, you can see the current position of a service, its train number and rolling stock type, and any delays relative to schedule.

Step 4: Yandex Rasp Train Map

https://rasp.yandex.ru/map/trains

This is a similar service, but it covers Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan, regions that geOps does not reach.

Step 5: Wikiroutes

https://wikiroutes.info

This is a crowdsourced directory of public transport routes covering trams, trolleybuses, buses, and metro systems in cities worldwide. It is not strictly a railway resource, but it is valuable for analyzing the last mile, meaning how passengers actually get from a station into the city, and for understanding how a rail network integrates with the rest of urban transport.

Step 6: City Population, network length statistics

https://www.citypopulation.de/en/world/bymap/railways

This is a statistical resource showing total railway track length broken down by country and region.

Summary

Rail infrastructure is one of the few types of critical infrastructure where states and operators voluntarily publish an enormous amount of detailed open data, simply because passengers need it. For an analyst that means a combination of free maps, trackers, and directories can produce a picture rivaling that of commercial geospatial analytics products. All it takes is knowing which tool covers which layer of the data.

If you’re looking to enhance your OSINT skills beyond just using this tool, consider exploring OSINT training. If you need assistance in uncovering the truth, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at hackers-arise@protonmail.com, and we’ll conduct a comprehensive OSINT investigation for you.

The post Open Source Intelligence (OSINT): What Open Maps and Trackers Reveal About Rail Networks first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, investigators!

The world is moving fast and it’s hard to keep up with everything happening around us. Not long ago, news from foreign places could take days or weeks to arrive. Now it’s different. Planes, ships, satellites, news and basically everything else is indexed and on the internet. The only problem is there are so many services and this fragmentation can drain your focus fast. But all these things can be integrated into one platform that runs locally.

We want to talk about ShadowBroker today. The developers did a great job making the tool professional, so it does deserve your attention. 

ShadowBroker

ShadowBroker is an OSINT dashboard designed to collect a wide variety of public intelligence feeds into its map interface. It visualizes live information from different sources, which includes aircraft and maritime tracking, satellite orbit data, reports on world conflicts and so much more.

The developers built it using Next.js for the frontend and MapLibre GL for rendering the interactive mapping layer. FastAPI and Python are used for the backend.

Setting Up

Before we start working with the dashboard, we need to set up a couple of things first. The tool does support different OS, but we’ll use Kali. 

ShadowBroker needs Docker and Docker Compose to be installed on the system.

Here are the commands that will help you set things up:

kali > sudo apt update
kali > sudo apt install docker.io
kali > sudo systemctl start docker
kali > sudo systemctl enable docker
kali > sudo apt install docker-compose
kali > sudo usermod -aG docker $USER
kali > newgrp docker

When you run these commands, you might be asked to restart different services. Press “Ok” and wait for the installation to complete. After the installation is complete, restart your Kali.

When your Kali boots, the Docker service should already be running. Now we can install ShadowBroker:

kali > git clone https://github.com/BigBodyCobain/Shadowbroker.git
kali > cd Shadowbroker

Once you’re in its directory, you need to run Docker commands with root privileges, otherwise it will throw an error:

kali > sudo su
root > docker compose pull
root > docker compose up -d

It will take a few minutes to install. Time spent on waiting really depends on you hardware and internet speed. It might take roughly 10 minutes. When Docker is done, see if ShadowBroker is up:

root > docker ps

You should see its containers in the output. Your system will keep them running in the background every time you boot.

Dashboard

Now we are ready to test it. Make sure you have allocated enough resources to your Kali VM to let it run smoothly. Open your browser and put this in the search bar: http://localhost:3000 (or try http://127.0.0.1:3000 if it doesn’t open anything).

When you open it for the first time, it will ask you for API keys. These keys are optional and you can skip this part. It will also offer you the option to hook up an AI agent to parse through the data and find correlations, but there is already enough data without it.

On the left side, there is a panel with many Data Layers with information that can be enabled or disabled. They include military flights, private jets, commercial aircraft, maritime vessels, satellite tracking, seismic activity and other global monitoring feeds. The list continues to expand.

It may feel overwhelming at first to work with the dashboard, so there is a legend with icon references. You can find it at the top of the left side, it has a small book icon.

News 

News alerts appear on the lower right side of the interface, categorized by their level of importance.

When significant events occur in a particular region, the platform aggregates related news articles and shows them as yellow clusters on the map. You can open these clusters and see the headlines with links that lead to original sources.

Red clusters contain information collected from Telegram. You can see them scattered across the globe. Quite often they have media attached to them. 

There is also Threat Intercept, these are big banners with alerts that you see on the screen in different regions. You can click and see more detailed information

Military Bases

The recent update brought military bases to the map. Here are some of them near the Strait of Hormuz

Antennas and Nodes

Antennas and Metastatic nodes are also available in the dashboard. You can tune in or send a message.

Satellite Monitoring

Satellites orbiting the Earth have different purposes. Some of them are used for weather forecasting, others give us communication services. There are also some used for recon, military and scientific missions. If you enable the satellite layer, you can see them moving across the planet.

GPS Jamming

GPS jamming can happen for several reasons, including military exercises, electronic warfare operations or just experimental testing.

Here you can see parts of Romania being jammed near the capital.

Aircraft Tracking

The dashboard has several categories of aircraft, including military planes, tracked VIP aircraft and commercial flights.

Some aircraft are tagged with additional information that identifies their owner. The one above belongs to the government of Morocco. You can look up specific individuals in the search bar. For instance, searching for the President of the United States will show the location of his aircraft if he’s flying somewhere. 

Satellite Captures

The satellite captures are updated on a daily basis. They can be useful for environmental monitoring and weather observation.

You can play with different layers under Satellites to see other things. For example, here is VIIRS Nightlight by NASA.

Summary

OSINT is generally about connecting many small pieces of publicly available information into one thing. It’s an arduous thing to do, since you have to jump from tab to tab and find ways to piece it all together. ShadowBroker brings all that aggregated and prioritized information into one platform. The developers have been taking good care of the project for almost half a year now since they published it. New things keep getting integrated, expanding the amount of data available for analysis. Given how simple it is to set up, it’s worth giving it a shot.

If you want to improve your OSINT skills, consider our OSINT training. Those who need assistance in finding the truth, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at hackers-arise@protonmail.com. We will conduct an investigation for you.

The post Open Source Intelligence (OSINT): Tracking World Events with ShadowBroker first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, aspiring cyberwarriors!

Space has become a contested domain. Thousands of satellites from various nations and commercial operators now compete for limited orbital slots. The lines between peaceful and military-use spacecraft are increasingly blurred. This creates significant challenges for analysts monitoring orbital activity.

Publicly available data, mainly Two-Line Element (TLE) sets from the US Space Force, provide an object’s location and trajectory. However, these data do not clarify whether behavior is normal, has changed, or what it might indicate.

Detecting an orbital maneuver using raw TLE data requires comparing historical element sets. It also involves predicting future positions and identifying differences between predicted and actual orbits. To link any maneuver to geopolitical events, like military exercises, analysts need additional layers of open-source analysis that basic tracking tools do not provide. SkyOSINT addresses both challenges: it helps with the technical detection of maneuvers and the correlation of intelligence.

In this article, we will explore what SkyOSINT is and how to get started with satellite tracking. Let’s get rolling!

What Is SkyOSINT?

SkyOSINT is an online platform that tracks over 15,000 objects in Earth orbit in real-time. It goes beyond just showing where these objects are; it combines location data with behavioral analysis, radio frequency (RF) monitoring, and geopolitical insight. Instead of just telling you where something is, SkyOSINT helps answer tougher questions: What’s this object up to? Is what it’s doing normal? And what does that mean in a wider geopolitical context?

Space OSINT and Space Domain Awareness

Space Situational Awareness (SSA) is all about knowing where objects in orbit are located, and it has been a key focus for the military and civil sectors since the Cold War. The U.S. Space Surveillance Network has been tracking these orbital objects since the 1950s and now monitors tens of thousands of satellites, rocket parts, and debris. Until recently, though, this information was mostly used to avoid collisions and manage catalogs rather than for intelligence analysis.

Space Domain Awareness (SDA) is a bigger concept that the U.S. Department of Defense formally adopted around 2019. It goes beyond just tracking locations to also understand the status, capabilities, and intentions of objects in orbit.

Another important aspect to understand is the TLE set. The Two-Line Element set (TLE) is the standard format for describing a satellite’s orbital details. The U.S. Space Force publishes TLEs for every tracked object in its catalog. A TLE includes six Keplerian orbital elements: inclination, right ascension of the ascending node, eccentricity, argument of perigee, mean anomaly, and mean motion. Together, these explain an object’s orbit at a specific time known as the epoch. By using these elements with the SGP4 propagation model, software can predict the object’s position at any future time.

Why Maneuver Detection Matters

When a satellite maneuvers and changes its orbit by firing thrusters, it is signaling something important. The type, strength, and timing of the maneuver all hold intelligence value. Routine moves, such as station-keeping for geostationary satellites to maintain their positions, are expected and not particularly significant. However, a maneuver that alters a satellite’s orbital plane, significantly changes its altitude, or brings it close to another object could be noteworthy.

Spotting these maneuvers from public TLE data can be problematic. TLEs come with measurement noise, get updated at random intervals, and use a simplified gravitational model. It takes advanced statistics to separate genuine maneuvers from noise and to determine the direction and size of a change in velocity known as delta-v. This is a core analysis function that SkyOSINT handles.

The RF Intelligence Layer

Positional tracking tells you where a satellite is located. At the same time, radio frequency monitoring shows whether it is communicating, which frequency bands it uses, and whether those signals match what operators have publicly announced. Radio Frequency Intelligence, or RFINT, has traditionally been the area of national signals intelligence agencies. However, with accessible software-defined radio technology, even hobbyists and open-source RF monitoring have become important contributors to the field of space intelligence.

When a satellite starts transmitting on a new frequency, increases its signal strength, or is detected communicating when it should be quiet, it is showing unusual behavior that can be very significant. By combining this RF data with positional information, we can confirm whether a satellite is active, determine its operational phase, and sometimes even link its actions to events on the ground below.

Get Started with SkyOSINT

To start tracking satellites, open the website https://skyosint.io/ in your browser. You will see a webpage similar to the one below.

By scrolling down, we can see how many foreign satellites are passing over US territory and which country they belong to.

In addition, we can see the core OSINT capabilities of this tool. We’ll explore these capabilities in practice a bit later. For now, let’s check the overflight report.

SkyOSINT provides very clear statistics. As shown in the screenshot above, there are currently over 1,200 Russian satellites flying over the U.S. at the time of writing this article. Additionally, we can see satellite classifications, passes near major cities, exact times, and the most active satellites, including their names, NORAD IDs, inclinations, periods, passes, and types.

When you return to the main page and scroll down, you will also see active conflict zones and key locations.

Let’s click Ukraine to monitor.

A pop-up will appear as shown below; you can click Start Exploring.

Here we can see five satellites, represented as green dots. By clicking on them, you’ll see additional information about each one on the right side of the screen.

We can observe not only satellites but also GPS threats like jamming or spoofing.

In addition, SkyOSINT offers a dark mode and displays streets along with restricted zones. With satellite imagery, we can observe both civil and military aircraft.

Summary

SkyOSINT represents a significant advancement in making space intelligence more accessible. Previously, the ability to detect orbital maneuvers, monitor radio frequency (RF) signals, and link space activities with geopolitical events was largely held by national space agencies, defense contractors, and well-funded commercial Space Domain Awareness (SDA) firms. While the data itself has been open, the analytical tools needed to derive meaningful insights from it were not readily available.

With SkyOSINT, those analytical tools are now offered through an easy-to-use web-based platform. Analysts who are knowledgeable in this field can now monitor the behavior of over 15,000 space objects.

If you’re looking to enhance your OSINT skills, consider exploring our OSINT training. If you need assistance in uncovering the truth, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at hackers-arise@protonmail.com, and we’ll conduct a comprehensive OSINT investigation for you.

The post Open Source Intelligence (OSINT): Track Satellite Movements with SkyOSINT first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, aspiring cyberwarriors!

In the reconnaissance phase of any security engagement, information gathering is crucial. Previously, we discussed using Google Earth Pro for investigations. Today, let’s shift our focus from satellite OSINT to map‑based reconnaissance. Many of you are already familiar with Google Maps and its alternatives, such as OpenStreetMap (OSM). But did you know that you can easily extract specific data from OpenStreetMap, like security cameras or Wi‑Fi hotspots, using a tool called Overpass Turbo?

Let’s explore in this article how to leverage this powerful reconnaissance tool.

Step #1: Understanding Overpass Turbo Basics

Overpass Turbo is accessible at https://overpass-turbo.eu and requires no installation or registration. It provides a web-based interface for querying the Overpass API, which is OpenStreetMap’s data extraction engine.

The interface consists of three main components:

Query Editor (left side): Where you write your queries using the Overpass Query Language (QL)

Interactive Map (right side): Displays your query results geographically

Toolbar (top): Contains the Run button, Wizard, Export options, and settings

When you first access Overpass Turbo, you’ll see a default query loaded in the editor. The map displays the current viewport, which you can pan and zoom to focus on your area of interest.

The Query Wizard

For beginners, the Wizard tool (accessible from the toolbar) provides a simplified interface. You can enter search terms in plain English, and the Wizard converts them into proper Overpass QL syntax. For example:

Type: amenity=atm in London

Click “build and run query”.

The Wizard generates the appropriate query syntax and executes it automatically.

As a result, we can see a map of ATMs in London.

Step #2: Writing Overpass Queries

Overpass Query Language follows a specific structure. Let’s break down the anatomy of our query built by a wizard:

[out:json][timeout:25];

// fetch area “London” to search in

{{geocodeArea:London}}->.searchArea;

// gather results

nwr["amenity"="atm"](area.searchArea);

// print results

out geom;

Tag Filters

The core of your reconnaissance queries are the tag filters. Tags in OSM follow a key=value structure.

node["key"="value"]

By opening the page at https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Map_features

you can view a comprehensive list of possible keys and values. From a hacker’s perspective, you can examine the man_made key to discover surveillance‑related options.

Now, let’s edit out query and try to find out surveillance cameras in California.

[out:json][timeout:25];

{{geocodeArea:California}}->.searchArea;

nwr["surveillance"="camera"](area.searchArea);

out geom;

Now, let’s try to find data centers in Moscow.

[out:json][timeout:25];

{{geocodeArea:Moscow}}->.searchArea;

nwr["building"="data_center"](area.searchArea);

out geom;

Summary

OpenStreetMap data helps companies and independent researchers work more efficiently. And Overpass Turbo simplifies tasks such as tracking urban growth and analyzing surveillance patterns. OSINT investigators and cyberwarriors can also use it to extract precise information from OpenStreetMap’s extensive geographic database.

If you’d like to advance in OSINT, consider checking out our OSINT training class.

The post OSINT: Locating Hidden Security Cameras with Overpass Turbo first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, aspiring cyberwarriors!

In the ongoing war between Ukraine and Russia, the battlefield has expanded far beyond trenches and artillery positions. In previous articles, we discussed how hackers attack Russian SCADA/ICS systems, conduct reconnaissance by hacking cameras, and much more. Hacktivists operate alongside conventional military forces to degrade enemy capabilities.

Recently, Ukrainian OSINT communities have published an interactive map cataloging 6,088 Russian defense factories, complete with detailed personal information on 1.2 million employees working within Russia’s military-industrial complex. This isn’t simply a list of company names and addresses. The database includes passport numbers, phone numbers, email addresses, and home addresses for over a million individuals involved in producing everything from missile systems and ammunition to drones and electronic warfare equipment.

In this article, we will analyze this database and explore how it may assist hackers in future cyber operations. Let’s get rolling!

Fire Up the Map

To get started with the map, open the website https://map.osint-varta.com/ in your browser. The site’s default language is Ukrainian, but you can easily translate the content using the built-in translator in your browser or by using a translation plugin.

Upon opening the website, you will see an interactive map displaying defense factories.

The website catalogs 6,088 enterprises spanning from Kaliningrad to Vladivostok, including factories involved in weapon production, repairs, and support infrastructure. All these factories are sorted by 16 production sectors for precise searches. For example:

Key Component Manufacturing (1,320 enterprises) – Suppliers of critical parts like electronics and materials.

Repair, Modernization, and Maintenance (1,231 enterprises) – Facilities keeping Russia’s arsenal operational.

Radioelectronics and Electronic Warfare (420 enterprises) – Tech for jamming signals and cyber defenses.

And more, covering everything from small arms to chemical protection gear.

By scrolling down, we can see company categories organized by sector, sanction status, and risk indicators.

Let’s take a closer look at the Radioelectronics and EW category. Here, we can access a well-organized page that allows us to search for the required company.

For example, let’s explore LLC “RESONANCE” in more detail.

At the top of the page, we find a wealth of information, such as whether the company is under sanctions, what it produces, a description of the company, and other relevant details. By scrolling down, we can access even more valuable information, including employee details.

This information includes names, passport data, email addresses, phone numbers, and locations – all of which can be easily exported as a CSV file.

Additionally, in the navigation bar, we can click “Managers” to search for CEOs and founders. The webpage provides the Tax Identification Number, positions, and relationships with the companies.

If you find the lists unclear, the website also provides graphs that illustrate the relationships between the companies.

Summary

The recently published database by Ukrainian OSINT communities offers a significant resource for understanding Russia’s military-industrial complex. The interactive map provides in-depth details about each company, including employee data that could be leveraged in future cyber endeavors.

For further insights into cyber operations and OSINT, consider our Subscriber Pro training package.

The post Open Source Intelligence (OSINT): Ukrainian Hacktivists Publish Massive Database of Russian Defense Facilities and Employee Data first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, aspiring cyberwarriors and OSINT investigators!

Today, we’re diving deeper into the world of social media OSINT, focusing specifically on TikTok. What started as a simple short-video app has rapidly transformed into a major global player, boasting over one billion active users who are constantly creating, sharing, and engaging with content at an unprecedented rate. While many view TikTok purely as a source of entertainment, this article will uncover how we can leverage various tools to gather valuable insights, including location data, network connections, and metadata. So, let’s get rolling!

Step #1: Decoding TikTok URL Metadata

Let’s dive into our first tool, Unfurl. This tool wasn’t created specifically for TikTok, but it’s useful for quickly gathering basic information about videos. Its name perfectly describes its purpose: it unfurls or unravels URL structures to uncover the valuable information embedded within them.

When you share a TikTok video, the URL carries much more than just a simple link to the content. TikTok encodes identifiers, timestamps, and metadata right into the URL, often in formats that aren’t easily decipherable at first glance. Unfurl takes these URLs and translates the embedded data into clear, visual formats, making analysis much more straightforward.

To get started, simply open dfir.blog/unfurl in your browser.

The interface is simple. Paste any TikTok video link into this field and click the Unfurl button. The tool processes the URL and generates a tree diagram showing all extracted metadata.

The screenshot above shows that we have extracted the video ID, a unique identifier assigned to each video on the platform. Additionally, the author’s username and timestamps embedded in TikTok URLs indicate when the content was published. Unfurl processes these timestamps from their encoded formats and translates them into easily readable dates and times.

Step #2: TikTok Timestamp

Bellingcat has released a tool that extracts the exact upload date and time from TikTok video URLs. You can use it after the link https://bellingcat.github.io/tiktok-timestamp/

It’s very simple, but it can sometimes be useful when doing an investigation. Just paste the link, and you’ll get the date and time.

Step #3: Gathering TikTok Account Intelligence

Let’s shift our focus to account-level insights rather than just individual video metadata. To do so, there’s a website called omar-thing.site that can help.

To begin, simply enter the username of the account you wish to explore and submit your query.

The results start with the avatar, which can be downloaded for further analysis. The account name and display name are extracted separately.

The account location is shown as the country where it was registered or where TikTok believes the user is based, in this case, Belarus. The account’s language is also listed.

Below that is the bio (blurred here due to ads), followed by key stats and details: the permanent user ID, creation date, dates of any username changes, and whether the account is private or public.

At the bottom of those details, we can find lists of followers and of those being followed. We can click to explore them further or download the information for analysis later.

Summary

By using a few simple tools, you can uncover a wealth of valuable information from TikTok. This article serves as a starting point for exploring this social media platform not just as a source of entertainment, but also as a treasure trove of insights.

If you’re looking to enhance your OSINT skills beyond just using these tools, consider exploring OSINT training. If you need assistance in uncovering the truth, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at hackers-arise@protonmail.com, and we’ll conduct a comprehensive OSINT investigation for you.

The post Open Source Intelligence (OSINT): Extracting Information from TikTok first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, aspiring OSINT investigators!

Most people are actively represented on social media. Moreover, they maintain their pages quite actively and publish a huge amount of interesting information about themselves. Therefore, if a person caught our attention during OSINT, it definitely makes sense to find their social media pages and examine them.

In this article, we will figure out how to effectively search by nickname using the Sherlock utility. Let’s get rolling!

What Does Sherlock Do?

Sherlock is an open-source OSINT tool designed to find usernames across a wide range of social networks and websites. It can currently check for a given username across 400+ websites and platforms, allowing investigators to quickly determine where a username is active.

Sherlock is designed to be straightforward for open source investigations: it does not require API keys or login credentials for the sites it checks; instead, it simply constructs the expected profile URL for each site and observes the response to determine whether the username exists on a given platform. This means it only accesses publicly available information and cannot bypass privacy settings or account restrictions.

Sherlock Installation & Usage

To install Sherlock, open a Linux terminal and run the command below.

kali> sudo apt install sherlock

Once the installation is complete, verify that Sherlock is installed correctly by running the help command:

kali> sherlock –help

After reviewing the help, we can move on directly to the search. We can do this by simply running the following command in the terminal:

kali> sherlock <username>

After some time, we can see 49 positive results. However, as with any tool, it’s important to verify whether these profiles match the person you’re searching for.

The results will be saved to a .txt file named after the search term. But according to the help screen, we can save the results in XLSX and CSV formats as well.

kali> sherlock <username> –csv

In the screenshot above, you can see at the top the command itself and at the bottom the results in CSV format.

Another valuable feature is limiting the scope to certain sites, for example, Instagram and GitHub.

kali> sherlock <username> –site GitHub –site Instagram

Moreover, we can modify the timeout and route requests through a proxy. The default timeout is 60 seconds, but let’s try reducing it to 1 second.

kali> sherlock –timeout 1 <username>

Summary

Sherlock is a powerful OSINT tool that offers a fast and efficient way to search for social media profiles across multiple platforms. It’s definitely one to add to your research toolbox!

If you want to improve your OSINT skills, check out this OSINT Investigator Bundle. It covers both fundamental and advanced techniques and includes an OSINT Certified Investigator Voucher.

The post Open-Source Intelligence(OSINT): Sherlock – The Ultimate Username Enumeration Tool first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, aspiring cyberwarriors!

Take a second and think about how many devices are actually working around you right now. Cameras on street corners, routers sitting inside nearby homes, Bluetooth earbuds in someone’s pocket, cell towers just outside of view. All of that is happening constantly, yet almost none of it is visible to the average person walking by. If you actually wanted to check what devices were nearby today, you would probably end up jumping from one app to another, waiting for each one to load, and still walking away without the full picture. It is slow, it is frustrating, and honestly, it takes all the fun out of exploring what is really going on around you.

A lot of these devices are not just sitting there minding their own business. Many of them are built specifically to track you. A recent video on X showed this. It captured a flock camera taking several pictures of a moving vehicle, running those pictures through some kind of analysis, and then filing everything away in an indexed format.

In the screenshot above, you can see the guy picking up the signal coming straight off the camera, while the camera itself keeps emitting a steady beam of infrared. Here is the full video.

Privacy is not a crime, and you have every right to know what might be watching you. The real challenge has always been figuring out where all of these surveillance devices are hiding. That’s where WireTapper can help us. It pulls data from Wigle, Shodan, and OpenCelliD one at a time. That way, you can see every one of these devices in your area.

WireTapper

WireTapper is a wireless OSINT tool designed to discover, map, and analyze radio based devices using passive signal intelligence. WireTapper detects and correlates signals coming from all the common wireless technologies you would expect to run into. This helps you understand what devices actually exist nearby and where they are likely located all without ever having to actively intrude on anything.

WireTapper can identify leaked Wi-Fi network credentials, and it does this through a privacy-protecting k-Anonymity query scheme, meaning it can check for exposed passwords without ever exposing your own search to the outside world.

Setting Up

Let’s quickly walk through the installation process. It’s a lot simpler than it looks.

kali > git clone https://github.com/h9zdev/WireTapper.git
kali > cd WireTapper
kali > python3 -m venv venv; source venv/bin/activate
kali > pip3 install -r WireTapper.txt

Once that finishes, you will need to grab API keys from each of the services mentioned above. Do not worry too much about Shodan, since its API is paid and WireTapper will still run fine without it. There are two ways to plug these keys into the app. You can either open app.py and enter them directly, or you can use app-env.py instead, which pulls the keys in through environment variables.

After you have picked your method, we recommend also installing python-dotenv, since it makes handling those environment variables a lot smoother.

kali > pip3 install python-dotenv

Working with WireTapper

Once everything is installed, you are ready to start the app and open the web interface.

kali > python3 app.py

The web interface will be waiting for you right here: http://localhost:8080/map-w

This is the dashboard you will land on the moment you open the page. It takes a little while to load everything, so give it a few minutes before you start clicking around. Once it settles in, you can zoom into whatever area you are curious about and start picking apart what is actually hiding there.

Just keep in mind that you need valid API keys for the app to work the way it is meant to. Without them, WireTapper will simply generate dummy data so you can still see how everything normally looks inside it. On Wigle specifically, your email needs to be verified before the connection will work properly.

At the top of the dashboard, you will notice a switch that lets you jump between Wi-Fi uplink and Bluetooth scanners. That is how you filter what you are looking at.

Flip the switch back the other way, and you get the same kind of view but for Wi-Fi devices instead. This side usually includes things like cameras, routers, and other similar devices.

Exporting Results

All of these results can be exported complete with their names and coordinates, in case you decide to use them somewhere else later on.

The example above is just a taste of how those exported results are going to look. You can use this JSON file with other tools.

Summary

There is far more happening around us than most people realize. WireTapper makes it easier to visualize that activity by bringing together information about nearby wireless infrastructure in one interface. If you’re into OSINT, privacy, or wireless security, it’s a handy tool. 

OSINT is a valuable skill in many areas, especially when it comes to privacy, cybersecurity, and cyber warfare. The more you understand what information is publicly exposed, the better you can protect yourself and your digital assets. Our Ultimate OSINT Beginner training covers OPSEC, tracking, investigations, and much more across 23 lessons and 7.5 hours of video content.

We’re also hosting a live Remaining Anonymous training on August 11-13 at 3:00 PM UTC for all Subscriber and Subscriber Pro students.

The post OSINT: WireTapper – Mapping Surveillance and Wireless Devices Around You first appeared on Hackers Arise.

Welcome back, aspiring cyberwarriors!

Open Source Intelligence, or OSINT, is a powerful yet underrated cybersecurity discipline. A solid reconnaissance phase uncovers vast target information before active probing even begins.

Traditionally, effective OSINT was a painful process. It meant juggling fragmented tools and manually parsing disjointed data to map a target. AI can completely automate this workflow. It calls the right tools in order and explains its analytical reasoning.

This article explores OpenOSINT, an automated intelligence agent built for security researchers. We will install the framework and test its core capabilities using real commands. Let’s get rolling!

What is OpenOSINT?

OpenOSINT is an artificial intelligence assistant designed to automatically gather public information and conduct digital investigations. To interact with OpenOSINT, you can choose from four different methods depending on your comfort level with computers. Beginners will likely prefer the web interface. For those who prefer working with text, the tool offers an interactive terminal. There is also a direct command line interface for running quick commands. Finally, it can act as a background server using MCP that plugs directly into other AI applications, like Claude Desktop.

The way this AI works makes it super reliable and gets rid of that annoying problem of AI making stuff up. When we ask OpenOSINT to do something, it connects to an AI engine. If the AI realizes it needs to look something up, it totally pauses and waits. Your computer then boots into tools, runs the actual program it needs, gathers the right info, and sends that back to the AI. Because the model has to wait for real results instead of just guessing, it can’t fake or invent any findings (or at least will do that less often).

If OSINT is a skill you want to develop seriously, we strongly encourage you to check out the dedicated OSINT series. It covers passive and active reconnaissance techniques, social media intelligence, geolocation, and much more, all taught by practitioners who do this work professionally.

Step 1: Installing OpenOSINT

Let’s clone and install the framework.

kali > git clone https://github.com/OpenOSINT/OpenOSINT.git

kali > cd OpenOSINT

From the observation of the source file, we can confirm that it’s a Python project. Our next step should be the installation of dependencies. Before that, it’s wise to create a dedicated virtual environment.

kali > pip install -e .

The command above uses the -e flag to install the package in editable mode. This means that any changes we make to the source files will be reflected immediately without the need to reinstall the package.

Next, we will install the external dependencies for OpenOSINT. Each dependency supports a specific investigation module, and the framework will still function properly even if some dependencies are missing. Holehe is used for email account enumeration, while Sherlock conducts username enumeration across more than 300 platforms. Sublist3r is utilized for subdomain enumeration. Installation is simple and can be done easily using pip.

kali > pip install holehe

kali > pip install sherlock-project

kali > pip install sublist3r

Another important tool for OpenOSINT is PhoneInfoga. It’s distributed as a standalone binary rather than a Python package, so download the latest release for your architecture from its GitHub releases page.

kali > tar -xzf phoneinfoga_Linux_x86_64.tar.gz

kali > sudo mv phoneinfoga /usr/local/bin/

Step 2: Configuring API Keys

OpenOSINT becomes significantly more effective when supplemented with additional information from external tools like VirusTotal. This integration allows OpenOSINT to gain a clearer understanding of the situation and ultimately make better decisions.

To configure the API keys, we need to open the .env file:

OpenOSINT supports a wide range of services. In this instance, I will specify my Anthropic API, VirusTotal, and Censys.

Step 3: Testing OpenOSINT Web Mode

OpenOSINT offers several ways to use its features. One of them is the AI REPL (Read-Eval-Print Loop), which is a simple, interactive programming environment that accepts user inputs, executes them, and returns the results. Another option is through the web interface, which I will use. There is also a direct tool usage method, but since it does not involve AI, I will not focus on it here, as we can use those tools directly without OpenOSINT.

To start the OpenOSINT web server, use the following command:

kali> openosint web

This command will open a webpage that looks like the one shown below.

Let’s start with a username investigation.

First, the system initiated a broad tool-based check across numerous platforms, returning raw data showing specific profile URLs for the username “tomilov” on sites ranging from Audiojungle and Behance to Codeforces and Discord, indicating presence on creative, social, and gaming platforms.

Finally, it synthesizes these findings into points, such as the subject’s probable Russian origin and their clear professional background. Essentially, the tool executed a digital footprinting task and transformed the results into categorized intelligence.

Next, let’s investigate a domain.

As shown in the screenshot above, the tool initiated its workflow by pulling WHOIS registration data, which fetched the registrar, the creation date from 2009, and the owning organization, LLC KUPISHUZ. At the same time, it performed a subdomain enumeration scan to map out associated hosts and queried VirusTotal to check the domain’s reputation against multiple security vendors.

The system then processed this raw data into a structured intelligence report. It verified that the domain possesses a long-standing, 14-plus year history with no malicious detections on VirusTotal. It also classified the discovered subdomains into operational roles, identifying specific functions such as a main website, a careers portal, internal networking infrastructure, an order tracking portal, and a Single Sign-On authentication platform.

Now, let’s test the email module.

This tool initiated its workflow by running an email enumeration scan using a utility called Holehe, checking the address across 121 websites. This initial check successfully verified active account registrations on Amazon, Flickr, Gravatar, Office365, and Twitter. During this phase, the tool also attempted to query breach data, paste sites, and search engine footprints, but these background tasks failed.

Following the raw scans, the tool generated a series of pre-configured Google dork links targeted at finding the email or username on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook. The system then compiled these results into an Investigation Summary, detailing the discovered platforms and extracting specific metadata, such as the full name and profile URL linked to the target’s Gravatar account.

Finally, the tool outlined a set of next steps for a manual investigator.

Now, let’s run automated open-source intelligence investigation on the specific IP address.

The single successful data extraction came exclusively from the VirusTotal module. This integration successfully returned infrastructure information revealing that the IP address belongs to a network block managed by Senko Digital LLC, which operates as a hosting or virtual private server provider located in Germany. More importantly, the tool retrieved threat assessment telemetry showing that twelve distinct security engines explicitly flagged this specific IP address as malicious, while one categorized it as suspicious, forty-six marked it clean, and thirty-two left it undetected.

Based entirely on this VirusTotal telemetry, the tool synthesized the findings into a security alert status. It concluded that the infrastructure carries a high risk because it is hosted by a VPS provider commonly leveraged for anonymity and possesses a high detection rate across reputable security vendors.

Summary

OSINT remains one of the most high-leverage skills in the cybersecurity field, and tools like OpenOSINT that bring AI-driven automation to the reconnaissance phase will only become more effective and beginner-friendly. If you want to develop your OSINT skills from first principles alongside hands-on tool training, make sure to check out the OSINT Training and join the growing community of intelligence practitioners.

The post Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Cybersecurity, Part 22: Grounding OpenOSINT with Real Tool Execution to Prevent AI Hallucinations first appeared on Hackers Arise.