Hi everyone ! Hope you’re all doing well.

So today I will show you how you can build your own virtual lab ( For malware analysis or pentest lab ), in this Tutorial I will use proxmox who is an Open Source Server solution.

Table of content

Proxmox is Open Source and easy to understand and if you have an old laptop you can use it to build you virtual lab.

With your Virtual lab you’ll be able to

e.g :

- Create an Enterprise network and try to get Admin privilege and learn How to fix the security breach

- Create an isolated Network for Malware analysis

- Creating a webserver and try to “Hack it”

- Setting up NAT, IDS, Firewall, ect

Now Let’s begin !

The first thing you need to do is download the iso here

Here the screenshot of the website where you can download proxmox

Installation process

Now that you have proxmox you can burn in on a CD or USB Drive.

( I will use virtualbox to show you the process of installation through screenshot )

1 - Select Install Proxmox VE

2 - Agree the General Public Licence

3 - Select the drive where you want to install proxmox and click next

Warning : The content of the disk will me overwritten so be careful if you want to make a dual boot.

You can click on Option to choose the filesystem of the disk, by default it will be ext4

4 - Type the country and select the keyboard layout

5 - Now set a password and use a valid email ( The email is used for password recovery )

6 - Here come the Networking

Choose the name of your hostname e.g : pentest.local

Fill all the input according to your Networking

*Set a static Ip ( Go in you router option ) *

If you have your own dns you can use it.

Congratulation ! You have installed proxmox

How to connect to the Virtual Lab

Now that you have finally installed Proxmox, use the static ip you’ve set to log in

https://yourip:8006/

Use the user and password that you set up

How to create a Virtual Machine

Now to create a Virtual machine select the Create a VM

Choose a name for your machine

Select the Operating systeme you’ll use

Then you need to select the iso you upload

Choose the size of the disk here :

Next is about the CPU

And the last thing is the memory and the networking configuration

Memory



Networking



If you want to use a debian, Arch Linux or something else you will need to upload the iso to your proxmox server

In the Left panel select Local ( thenameofyourserver )

Select the content tab and you’re ready to upload your iso !

P.S : If you need more information and something is not clear I will update this tutorial