Ethical Hacking Foundations: Malware Development in Windows (Udemy.com)
Build your own custom Windows malware from scratch. Become a better ethical hacker, pentester and red teamer!
Created by: Reenzo Black
Last updated July 2023
What you will learn
- What is malware development in Windows
- What is PE file structure
- Where to store your payload inside PE
- How to encode and encrypt payloads
- How and why obfuscate function calls
- How to backdoor programs
- How to inject your code into remote processes
How it compares
Against the other 523 rated Udemy courses in Hacking on CourseDuck:
- Rating4.7 out of 5higher than 85% of them
- Reviews440#303 of 524 by number of reviews
- Length2.9 hoursshorter than 71% of them
- Last updatedJuly 2023earlier than 65% of them
Course Description
Are you a pen tester having some experience with Metasploit or Empire frameworks? Or maybe you take your first steps as an ethical hacker and you want to know more about how all these offensive tools work? Or you are a blue teamer or threat hunter who needs to better understand the internal workings of malware?
This course will provide you the answers you're looking for. It will teach you how to develop your own custom malware for latest Microsoft Windows 10. And by custom malware we mean building a dropper for any payload you want (Metasploit meterpreter, Empire or Cobalt Strike beacons, etc.), injecting your shellcodes into remote processes, creating trojan horses (backdooring existing software) and bypassing Windows Defender AV.
You will receive a virtual machine with complete environment for developing and testing your software, and a set of source code templates which will allow you to focus on understanding the essential mechanisms instead of less important technical aspects of implementation.
Instructor Details
- 4.7 Rating
440 Reviews
Reenzo Black
Chief Research Officer at SEKTOR7. In the industry for over 20 years. Worked in global Red Team for almost a decade. Simulated threat actors targeting IT infrastructure across various industries (financial, technology, industrial, energy, aviation) around the world. Speaker at HackCon, PWNing, WTH@ck, Sec-T, T2, DeepSec. Gave guest lectures at several military and civil academies and universities.
Founder of x33fcon security conference and SEKTOR7 offensive research company
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Reviews
By Nick Sibbald on 10/27/2025
Really good short course. Shows how virus code actually works. You get hands on practical exercises where you are guided through the process of actually building Windows based virus executables. The course give the ethical hacker the tools to create viruses to test the vulnerability of computer systems like Windows. I highly recommend this course.
By Keith Messick on 7/25/2024
Amazing course. This is a high level of hacking expertise. Definitely not for beginners. Advanced C-lang, Python, and Red-Team concepts were covered. I would have liked a few more examples, but overall a very good course. Thank you!
By Aaron Beardslee on 6/25/2024
I took the course to learn specifically about how to build weaponized dll files and walked away with a TON more techniques than I had hoped for. I definitely learned what I bought the course for, though! Well done!
By Faan Rossouw on 3/26/2024
this was literally the greatest course i've done in my life, and i've done 100+. i think the combination of explanation, practical run-through, and debugging (with earlier examples, pity it was dropped later on) is such an effective methodology. the present speaks a bit slow, but i just set it to 1.75x and it was good. i finished this in about 4 days (and did extra research, going beyond and deconstructing code with claude3 etc), and i can say it changed me from someone that was interested in mal dev, to someone that is now obsessed (my wife can attest to this). i woke up this morning at 4am so excited to get going again, it's 5:55 am now and despite the intermediate course on sektor7 website being way more expensive i am jumping straight into it. thanks SO MUCH for making this available here at this price reenzo, honestly i don't think i would have risked it by paying $300 for the beginner course but you've made a loyal customer and my goal is to complete all your courses over the year. can't express enough what an incredible experience this course was, holy smokes.
By Robert White on 11/1/2023
Pretty awesome course. Instructor speaks clearly, walks through the concepts of why the code and exploits is doing and then demonstrates. The C - Code is available for download and this course provides a Win10 VM -- so no typos or mistakes. VM contains the debugger files too -- which avoids finding a specific version! Thus, the learning environment is pretty much turn key and simple to follow along. Note -- the exploits taught here use non malicious shellcode - so this is a safe learning environment. Overall, very happy with the material, the speed in which things are explained and taught and can honestly recommend this to others. Last note, you want a firm understanding of C Code, exploits, and a good understanding of debugging and how application work in memory. You can take the course without it -- but please be prepared to watch some YouTube videos, read some coding / hacker books, or enroll in other Udemy courses to truly grasp the concepts taught here.
By Wodan _ on 2/2/2023
Fantastic course. Very clear, very concise. Laser-focused on Droppers, how they work, how to obfuscate and pivot, how to insert them into a real world binary. This course does not teach payload/shellcode construction, so don't expect that. This is just about how to get whatever payload where it has to go. Only regret is that the instructor did not spend any real time on AMSI bypassing (AMSITrigger), or equivalent.
By Albert Gunawan on 5/26/2022
Instructor seem very knowledgeable on the topic, however he was not very good in explaining it to students step by step and seemed not engaged while explaining them as well. Some of my questions were not answered by the instructor for months now, if any.
By Tomas Rampas on 5/21/2022
Excellent study materials for aspiring RED teamers. Reenzo explains everything clearly, all materials and code samples are good, practical, and to the point. The course satisfies my needs as an experienced developer but a novice in Ethical Hacking programming.
By Jay San on 9/9/2021
Even with a bit of experience with malware authoring, there's a tad bit of experience to pick up from this course. Was a delight to skim through some content and realize I ought to deep dive the whole thing before dismissing it. Interested to possibly pick up other sektor7/Reenzo Black courses in the near future to see if there's more nuggets like I found in this course. Thanks for the great course!
By Boyd Kirkman on 1/21/2021
This is the perfect course for someone who understands some programming and wants to properly understand malware development and functionality both conceptualy and practically. Would highly recommend.
Quality Score
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Overall Score : 94 / 100






