Install eve-ng and run it with VirtualBox

This quick tutorial will demonstrate the steps needed to install eve-ng and VirtualBox, to then run eve-ng with VirtualBox.

NOTE: To avoid having to manually set up required Python bindings for VirtualBox, download Python from this link. Install Python. Then, open Command Prompt (cmd), type the following command and press Enter.

C:\Users\YOUR_USERNAME> pip install pywin32

VirtualBox: Downloads — Oracle VM VirtualBox

The Windows hosts link will download the Windows .exe file for VirtualBox. After it finishes downloading, if we Open the .exe file the Setup will initialize. Click Next twice and then Yes, however make sure you don’t have any important processes running that would depend on internet connectivity.

Click on Install and after some minutes click on Finish. We are now ready for eve-ng to be initialized in VirtualBox.

eve-ng: https://www.eve-ng.net

This is the official eve-ng website from which we can download different versions, depending on our objectives. For this tutorial, we will click on the Download tab and look for the Free EVE Community Edition Version 5.0.1–13 (as of November 2022). In my case, I opted to download the .zip file (EVE-NG OVF — Google mirror).

Next, we click on “Download anyway” and wait until the file is fully downloaded. I opted to create a folder named Projects in Desktop so all the files from the downloaded .zip file can be extracted there.

The reason why we downloaded a .zip file versus a traditional .iso for eve-ng, is due to the .zip file containing this .ovf file, that by double-clicking on it will pre-configure all the requirements for eve-ng to be initialized at VirtualBox.

After clicking Finish for the Appliance Settings and waiting for VirtualBox to conclude importing, VirtualBox will be able to Start eve-ng. We will then be prompted the following:

Eve-NG (default root password is 'eve')
Use http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx/

eve-ng login:

By default, the credentials for eve-ng are the following:

Eve-NG (default root password is 'eve')
Use http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx/

eve-ng login: root
Password: eve

Type eve for Root Password and hit enter. Similarly, keep eve-ng as the Hostname, example.com as the DNS domain name and use DHCP IP Address. Furthermore, for NTP server, we won’t be using it for this implementation, thus leave it blank and hit Enter. Finally, proceed with the Direct Connection option for Proxy Server configuration.

Once eve-ng finishes configuring itself, the VM will prompt the following:

Eve-NG (default root password is 'eve')
Use http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx/

eve-ng login:

Note “xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx”, this will be the IP address that you will type and go to in your web browser. Below is the resulting login interface, where, by default we will fill as such and Sign In.

Username: admin
Password: eve

We have successfully installed and initialized eve-ng with VirtualBox. Below is a snapshot of eve-ng’s dashboard.