Kali Linux : Lesson 1.0​: The Beginning

Created By: Arvind GK

Module 1.

Lesson 1.0​: The Beginning

(Use Comments Section for your doubts and question)

What is Kali Linux?

Kali Linux is a Security Distribution of Linux specifically designed for digital forensics and penetration testing. It was developed by Mati Aharoni and Devon Kearns of Offensive Security through the rewrite of BackTrack. BackTrack was their previous information security Operating System. The first iteration of Kali Linux was Kali 1.0.0 was introduced in March 2013. Offensive Security currently funds and supports Kalin Linux. If you were to visit Kali's website today (www.kali.org), you would see a large banner stating, "Our Most Advanced Penetration Testing Distribution, Ever." A very bold statement that ironically has yet to be disproven.

Kali Linux has over 600 preinstalled penetration-testing applications to discover. Each program with its unique flexibility and use case. Kali Linux does excellent job separating these useful utilities into the following categories:

1. Information Gathering
2. Vulnerability Analysis
3. Wireless Attacks
4. Web Applications
5. Exploitation Tools
6. Stress Testing
7. Forensics Tools
8. Sniffing & Spoofing
9. Password Attacks
10. Maintaining Access
11. Reverse Engineering
12. Reporting Tools
13. Hardware Hacking

Who uses Kali Linux and Why?

Kali Linux is truly a unique operating system, as its one of the few platforms openly used by both good guys and bad guys. Security Administrators, and Black Hat Hackers both use this operating system extensively. One to detect and prevent security breaches, and the other to identify and possibly exploit security breaches. The number of tools configured and preinstalled on the operating system, make Kali Linux the Swiss Army knife in any security professionals toolbox.

Professionals that use Kali Linux

Security Administrators – Security Administrators are responsible for safeguarding their institution's information and data. They use Kali Linux to review their environment(s) and ensure there are no easily discoverable vulnerabilities.

Network Administrators – Network Administrators are responsible for maintaining an efficient and secure network. They use Kali Linux to audit their network. For example, Kali Linux has the ability to detect rogue access points.

Network Architects – Network Architects, are responsible for designing secure network environments. They utilize Kali Linux to audit their initial designs and ensure nothing was overlooked or misconfigured.

Pen Testers – Pen Testers, utilize Kali Linux to audit environments and perform reconnaissance on corporate environments which they have been hired to review.

CISO – CISO or Chief Information Security Officers, use Kali Linux to internally audit their environment and discover if any new applications or rouge configurations have been put in place.

Forensic Engineers – Kali Linux posses a "Forensic Mode", which allows a Forensic Engineer to perform data discovery and recovery in some instances.

White Hat Hackers – White Hat Hackers, similar to Pen Testers use Kali Linux to audit and discover vulnerabilities which may be present in an environment.

Black Hat Hackers – Black Hat Hackers, utilize Kali Linux to discover and exploit vulnerabilities. Kali Linux also has numerous social engineer applications, which can be utilized by a Black Hat Hacker to compromise an organization or individual.

Grey Hat Hackers – Grey Hat Hackers, lie in between White Hat and Black Hat Hackers. They will utilize Kali Linux in the same methods as the two listed above.

Computer Enthusiast – Computer Enthusiast is a pretty generic term, but anyone interested in learning more about networking or computers, in general, can use Kali Linux to learn more about Information Technology, networking, and common vulnerabilities.

​Getting Kali up and Running 

Directly on a PC, Laptop – Utilizing a Kali ISO image, Kali Linux can be installed directly onto a PC

Virtualized (VMware, Hyper-V, Oracle VirtualBox, Citrix) – Kali Linux supports most known hypervisors.

Cloud (Amazon AWS, Microsoft Azure) – Given the popularity of Kali Linux, both AWS and Azure provide images for Kali Linux.

USB Boot Disc – Utilizing Kali Linux's ISO, a boot disc can be created to either run Kali Linux on a machine without actually installing it or for Forensic purposes.

Windows 10 (App) – Kali Linux can now natively run on Windows 10, via the Command Line. Not all features work yet as this is still in beta mode.

Mac (Dual or Single boot) – Kali Linux can be installed on Mac, as a secondary operating system or as the primary. Parallels or Mac's boot functionality can be utilized to configure this setup.

Terminal

GNOME Terminal can be started from the list of favourite applications. You can also type “terminal” while in the Activities screen (the one that gets activated when you move the mouse to the top-left corner) and click on the correct application icon that appears 

Terminal

Command Line Interface or cli, some useful commands

List & Copy

# List all files in a long listing (detailed) format

ls -al

# Display the present working directory

pwd

# Create a directory

mkdir directory

# Remove (delete) file

rm file

# Remove the directory and its contents recursively

rm -r directory

# Force removal of file without prompting for confirmation

rm -f file

# Forcefully remove directory recursively

rm -rf directory

Cat & Yum

# View the contents of file

cat file

# Browse through a text file

less file

# Display the first 10 lines of file

head file

# Display the last 10 lines of file

tail file

# Display the last 10 lines of file and "follow" the file as it grows.

tail -f file

Cd To go up one level of the directory tree. (Change into the parent directory.)

cd ..

# Go to the $HOME directory

cd

# Change to the /etc directory

cd /etc

Try some on the terminal 

Listing Files

To list the files and directories stored in the current directory, use the following command −

$ls
Here is the sample output of the above command −

$ls
kali-linux.png running.png sg30.sdv sg30.thm terminal.png

If you type $ls -l (-l for long listing)
Here is the sample output of the above command −

$ ls -l
total 3840
-rw-r--r-- 1 arvind arvind 215997 May 30 08:54 kali-linux.png
-rw-r--r-- 1 arvind arvind 166717 May 30 09:00 running.png
-rw-r--r-- 1 arvind arvind 2048 Jan 2 11:50 sg30.sdv
-rw-r--r-- 1 arvind arvind 565 Jan 2 11:50 sg30.thm
-rw-r--r-- 1 arvind arvind 3525080 May 30 08:55 terminal.png

The df Command

The first way to manage your partition space is with the df (disk free) command. The command df -k (disk free) displays the disk space usage in kilobytes, as shown below −

out put of df -k will look similar to this 

$ df -k
Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on udev
1923300 0 1923300 0% /dev


tmpfs 391684 25904 365780 7% /run
/dev/sda6 82045616 59397976 18453336 77% /
tmpfs 1958416 76332 1882084 4% /dev/shm
tmpfs 5120 0 5120 0% /run/lock
tmpfs 1958416 0 1958416 0% /sys/fs/cgroup
/dev/loop0 93568 93568 0 100% /snap/core/8689
/dev/sda3 103182232 80075180 17822652 82% /100
tmpfs 391680 36 391644 1% /run/user/1000
/dev/sda7 1038336 106160 932176 11% /media/arvind/9847f076-
473b-4ce4-b817-33a7fb1809f6

Application in KaliLinux

1. Nmap. Kali Linux Nmap. ...
2. Lynis. Lynis Kali Linux Tool. ...
3. WPScan. WordPress is one of the best open source CMS and this would be the best free WordPress security auditing tool. ...
4. Aircrack-ng. ...
5. Hydra. ...
6. Wireshark. ...
7. Metasploit Framework. ...
8. Skipfish.

Installing Kali Linux in Live Persistence Mode on USB 

You will need Kali Linux do to your practical exercise, I would suggest take a USB drive about 16GB in size and install Kali Linux Live in persistence mode, why persistence because you can add new application and save setting, every-time you boot from USB, the previous done activity will be available as if you have booted from your hard-disk. 

Now to creating persistence drive for your learning exercise. 

Follow each and every steps carefully to avoid unnecessary errors. 

Installing Kali Linux in Live Persistence Mode on USB

STEP 1: Download Kali Linux ISO Image from the official Kali Linux website

STEP 2: Then Download Power iso, and create a bootable USB.

STEP 3: Now your are ready for the installation, Reboot your device and enter into Boot Menu.

STEP 4: choose the Bootable USB stick and you will see the Kali Linux installation option, In that choose Live system ( 1st option ).

NOTE: While entering to Live Kali Linux generally it won’t ask for username and password. In case if it asked then Type “ root “ as username and “ toor “ as password. ( the latest version of Kali linux will not have this standard password, you will be asked to enter the password

STEP 5: Now open up your terminal and type the following commands one by one.“ fdisk -l

#the above command will list out all the disk that are available in your Laptop or PC . Now note down the USB name ( mostly it will be /dev/sdb ).

fdisk /dev/sdb
#now it will ask you for command, type n and hit enter
Now press enter 4 times, and type w and hit enter.
#we have successfully created the partition.
Installing Kali Linux in Live Persistence Mode on USB
fdisk -l
#now check whether the partition has been created or not ( copy the name of the partition that you created now eg: /dev/sdb3 )
mkfs.ext4 -L persistence /dev/sdb3
#wait until it complete and after it completes type,
e2label /dev/sdb3 persistence
#the above command will label the partition with the name persistence
mkdir -p /mnt/hackison (you can use any name )
mount /dev/sdb3 /mnt/hackison
echo “/ union” > /mnt/hackison/persistence.conf
umount /dev/sdb3
exit

#now reboot your laptop or Pc. and enter into your boot menu

STEP 6: In the Kali Linux Boot Menu choose the 4th option Live system ( Persistence )

STEP 7: Now Let’s check whether the persistence is working good or not. To do that just change your background or create a new folder.

STEP 8: Now reboot your device and again enter into Live System ( Persistence)

NOTE: Each and every time when you want to go to persistence mode you need to choose that option.

Summary

We Got Introduced to Kali Linux

We saw who uses it

We saw why it is unique

Command line 

Terminals 

Installation of Kali Linux

We saw some of the application that comes a standard with it.

Use comment section for your doubts and questions