Practical OSINT: The Complete Course for Beginners

Set up a safe, legal penetration testing lab using VMware, deploying Kali Linux as the attacker and Metasploitable 2 as the target, connected via NAT networking.

Install VMware Workstation Pro on your PC to run multiple operating systems and create an isolated testing environment, by downloading from Broadcom, registering an account, and installing for personal use.

Download the pre-built Kali Linux virtual machine image and open it in VMware, then adjust RAM and NAT networking, boot, and use commands like who am I and ifconfig.

Build a cloud-based OSINT lab with Google Cloud, Ubuntu 20.04, and cars, installing Kali, Trace Labs, Tor, Brave, and Chrome, then stream the workspaces securely from anywhere.

Explore how Google dorking and advanced search tools unlock OSINT, demonstrating site filters, file-type searches, subdomain enumeration, and cross-source verification across engines.

Learn basic people OSINT techniques to locate online information with targeted Google searches, refined queries (company and location), image searches, and Wayback Machine archives to build a detailed profile.

Discover how to locate files related to a target using the file type operator in google docs and analyze metadata to reveal author, organization, software, and timestamps.

Learn to generate Google dorks with AI using Dork GPT, craft targeted queries for PDFs and Quora posts, and broaden searches by relaxing quotation marks to improve OSINT efficiency.

Explore email osint by gathering and validating email addresses from public sources, analyzing metadata and domain information, and linking social profiles and data breaches for cybersecurity insights.

Discover how to perform username OSINT and social media profiling across platforms, forums, and databases. Use tools like Sherlock and Gumshoe to map a target's digital footprint from a username.

Explore how breached credentials are collected and analyzed in osint, using breach databases and sources like Have I Been Pwned and Proxy Nova to profile targets and password habits.

Explore leaked credentials with Osint Week.com by searching usernames or emails in the free tier; view partial passwords and hashed entries, and consider cracking or pass-the-hash attacks.

Learn how WebVetted turns an email, phone, username, or domain into a full intelligence report, revealing breached data, linked profiles, and domain risk analysis.

Identify whether data appears in breaches using Have I Been Pwned and Dehashed. Set up a secure VM, download databases via torrent, and search offline with Agent Ransack.

Install a Windows 11 virtual machine with VMware, download VMware Workstation Pro and the Windows 11 ISO, configure hardware and NAT networking, then install VMware Tools for optimal performance.

Install Utorrent and Agent Ransack to download and explore breached databases for educational purposes. Follow ethical and legal guidelines when handling leaked data and search with Agent Ransack.

Explore a historic Facebook data leak and learn OSINT techniques to map phone numbers to unique Facebook IDs and profiles, highlighting privacy risks and digital footprints.

Examine the 200 million Twitter data breach and show how an email address unlocks de-anonymized social media identities, linking names, usernames, and profiles for open-source intelligence.

Explore the LinkedIn data breach, detailing 164 million exposed emails and passwords, the 2012 hack with unsalted sha-1 storage, and verification with Have I Been Pwned.

Learn how to locate and download leaked databases from dedicated data-breach websites and forums, including size of cat, breach forums CDN, cracking, breach forums, and LeakBase.io.

Master practical Osint methods to uncover phone numbers, including social media checks and Google dorking with targeted search operators. Explore browser extensions and leaked databases as sources for contact details.

Validate a phone number to establish the base layer of osint by confirming country, city where available, number type, and carrier using multiple analytical tools.

Use osint to identify a phone number's current owner and history, starting with a strategic Google search in multiple formats and cross-checking with crowdsourced and data broker tools.

Turn a phone number into a digital footprint using Epeios, Castaic, and Osint industries, visualize connections, and pivot to professional profiles with Signal Hire and breached databases.

Explore how people search engines aggregate public data to build profiles, including names, phone numbers, addresses, relatives, and social profiles, focusing on United States–based tools.

Trace a name's origin to narrow searches and guide osint work from a username or email. Apply Namsos to predict country and gender, then verify with FamilySearch.org for historical links.

Enrich a target’s name with extra data, cast a wide net with social searcher to find potential accounts, then verify with id crawl by cross-checking photos and bios.

Discover how to locate a person's political affiliation using public voter registration records via aggregators, verify data with multiple sources, and account for state-by-state data availability.

Discover how public registries for weddings and baby showers reveal identities, partners, dates, and locations for Osint investigations. Use workflow across Amazon, aggregators, and The Knot to extract lifestyle clues.

Discover open source intelligence on Instagram by analyzing profiles, bios and followers, exporting data with extensions, downloading posts, and using reverse image search, metadata, and user IDs.

Master Facebook OSINT techniques to extract work history, education, locations, life events, and social connections from profiles, photos, and posts, then extend insights using IDs and public post searches.

Explore TikTok OSINT by analyzing profiles and liked videos, extracting the permanent TikTok ID, and decoding post IDs to obtain timestamps for research timelines.

Explore Twitter X as a major OSINT resource by using the search bar and tabs to find posts and profiles, and apply operators like from and until.

Learn WhatsApp osint fundamentals, including STUN-based discovery of public IPs during a call, using Wireshark to capture binding packets, and identifying publicly available business-number information.

Explore basic image osint by extracting metadata with ExifTool and performing reverse image searches to identify locations, devices, and social media associations, enriching investigations.

Learn how facial recognition tools like Face ID, Pimeyes, and Search for faces enable OSINT researchers to find people from photos, while evaluating results and spotting impersonation risks.

Learn how AI-powered image geolocation drives OSINT by inferring a photo’s origin from clues—architecture, terrain, vegetation, and shadows—without GPS data, using tools like where is this photo and find location.

Explore how maps power osint by using Google Maps, Street View, satellite imagery, and historical data to geolocate, verify locations, and leverage crowdsourced ground-level imagery from Mapillary and Kadhavu.

Track email origin and detect spoofing or spam by analyzing headers, sender IPs, mail servers, and hops, then verify SPF, DKIM, and dMarc results using header viewers.

Analyze phishing emails through practical OSINT techniques in a beginner friendly challenge, sharpening critical thinking, email threat identification, and cyber hygiene.