The TCP/IP Swiss army knife: chat, banner-grab, transfer files, listen for shells. Tiny, everywhere, and the answer to half of 'how do I just connect to this thing?' questions.
Follow the steps — click any step card to replay the terminal demo from that point. Everything runs in a lab you control.
Version banners = free recon. -n numeric, -v verbose.
The receiver you run before triggering a reverse shell.
No sharing tools handy? nc moves bytes anywhere.
-e exists only on some builds — show it in the lab, understand why it's dangerous.
Quiet, scriptable open-port probing.
| -nvlp PORT | listen verbose, no DNS |
| -nv HOST PORT | connect |
| -z | zero-I/O scan |
| -w N | timeout seconds |
| -u | UDP mode |
| -e prog | exec on connect (danger!) |
On targets you pop: `which nc ncat socat` is an instant stabilization step.
Upgrade dumb shells to full TTY: python3 -c 'import pty;pty.spawn("/bin/bash")'.
ncat (Nmap project) adds TLS; socat is the elder god — learn it after.
revshells.com generates your payload; nc catches it.
Use Netcat (nc) only on systems you own or have written permission to test. Your lab: Kali + Metasploitable2, DVWA, TryHackMe & HackTheBox — plenty of legal targets, zero risk.