Email Address:
admin@achik.us achikahmed.info@gmail.com
Our Social Media Profiles:
theHarvester Tutorial for Beginners – Email & Domain OSINT Tool
theHarvester is a popular OSINT and information gathering tool that is used to collect emails, subdomains, IP addresses, employee names, and other public information from different online sources. It is widely used by cybersecurity learners, penetration testers, and ethical hackers for reconnaissance and domain investigation tasks. Here’s what you can do with theHarvester:
- Collect public email addresses.
- Find subdomains of a target domain.
- Discover IP addresses.
- Gather OSINT information.
- Perform reconnaissance tasks.
- Learn cybersecurity and OSINT commands.
What is theHarvester?
theHarvester is an open-source reconnaissance and OSINT tool available for Linux systems. It gathers publicly available information from search engines, DNS records, and other online sources for cybersecurity research and security testing purposes.
Linux Distribution Used in This Tutorial
In this tutorial, we will use Ubuntu or Kali Linux to install and use theHarvester. The installation commands in this guide are mainly for Debian-based Linux distributions such as Ubuntu, Kali Linux, Debian, Linux Mint, and Parrot OS.
Install theHarvester
Below are the simple steps to install and use theHarvester on Debian-based Linux systems.
Update Linux packages first:
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -yInstall Python, pip, and Git packages:
sudo apt install python3 python3-pip git -yClone theHarvester GitHub repository:
git clone https://github.com/laramies/theHarvesterMove into theHarvester directory:
cd theHarvesterInstall theHarvester using pip:
pip3 install .Start theHarvester help menu:
theHarvester -hDisplays theHarvester help menu and available options.
theHarvester Usage Commands
As we install theHarvester on Linux, it needs commands to perform different OSINT and reconnaissance tasks. Below are some useful usage commands that can be used to collect emails, find subdomains, gather public information, and perform basic domain investigation directly from the Linux terminal.
Search emails from a domain:
theHarvester -d example.com -b googleCollects publicly available email addresses from Google search results.
Find subdomains of a target domain:
theHarvester -d example.com -b bingSearches for subdomains using Bing search engine.
Use all available search sources:
theHarvester -d example.com -b allPerforms OSINT search using all supported sources.
Save results into an HTML file:
theHarvester -d example.com -b google -f resultSaves scan results into output files.
Search using DuckDuckGo source:
theHarvester -d example.com -b duckduckgoUses DuckDuckGo search engine for information gathering.
theHarvester Basic Commands
Show help menu:
theHarvester -hDisplay available data sources:
theHarvester -lLimit the number of search results:
theHarvester -d example.com -b google -l 50Search target domain with verbose output:
theHarvester -d example.com -b google -vTypes of theHarvester Commands
- theHarvester -d example.com -b google : Collects emails and subdomains using Google.
- theHarvester -d example.com -b bing : Searches information using Bing source.
- theHarvester -d example.com -b all : Uses all available search engines and sources.
- theHarvester -d example.com -b duckduckgo : Performs OSINT search using DuckDuckGo.
- theHarvester -d example.com -b google -f result : Saves results into output files.
- theHarvester -h : Shows help menu and available options.
Choose the command you want and theHarvester will automatically perform the selected OSINT and reconnaissance task directly inside the Linux terminal.
End Note
theHarvester is a useful OSINT and reconnaissance tool for collecting public information from domains and online sources. It helps beginners learn email gathering, subdomain discovery, and basic cybersecurity investigation techniques directly from Debian-based Linux systems using simple terminal commands.
