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The Five Linux Distros Hackers Prefer

by MorpheuslordMay 20th, 2021

Too Long; Didn't Read

These are the various Linux distros considered the best for hacking and penetration testing. We will be discussing five operating systems, there benefits and drawbacks. These are operating systems with the best kernel installed in it and with the solid configs are considered best o/s for a hacker. The Top 5 os are: Kali Linux, BackBox, BlackArch-Linux and BlackArch. Parrot OS is a Linux distribution based on Debian with a focus on security. BlackArch is a penetration testing distribution that provides a large amount of cybersecurity tools.

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These are operating systems with the best kernel installed in it and with the solid configs are considered best o/s for a hacker. This is the basic requirement. There is a wide range for selection. We will be discussing five operating systems, there benefits and drawbacks .

The Top 5 os Are

Kali Linux
BackBox
Parrot os
Blackarch-linux
DEFT linux

These are the various Linux distros considered the best for hacking and penetration testing.

Kali Linux

Kali is one of the most most popular and a Linux distro preferred by offensive security It has all the tools required organized in a very orderly manner. I prefer to use this as there are new updates given in regular intervals. Kali is an open-source distro and it is built on debian which is a really fast distro in its own right.

Kali tools : Kali Linux contains a large number of penetration testing tools from various different niches of the security and forensics fields. This site aims to list them all and provide a quick reference to these tools. In addition, the versions of the tools can be tracked against their upstream sources. Here is the tool listing website kali.org

Kali metapackages : Metapackages give you the flexibility to install specific subsets of tools based on your particular needs. For instance, if you are going to conduct a wireless security assessment, you can quickly create a custom Kali ISO and include the kali-linux-wireless metapackage to only install the tools you need.

kali advantages :

Advanced Penetration Testing tools : In the Kali Linux, more than 500+ advanced Penetration Testing tools are included. The tools of BackTrack Linux which are not up to the mark or repeated in many ways has been replaced in the Kali Linux system with the advanced penetration testing tools.
Free Linux tool : The Kali Linux system is totally free like the BackTrack Linux and will always offer their users the free life time services. This is huge plus factor which forces people to use this system.
Open sourced Git : This Kali Linux is an openly sourced system and can be easily accessed by the users. All the codes in the Kali Linux can be viewed easily by anyone and the open development source makes easy to view the development of coding at every step.
Support : Kali address to the File-system Hierarchy Standard, allowing Linux users to easily locate binaries, support files, libraries, etc. This is the very important feature of the Kali Linux that makes it stand out among the other Linux systems. The new update has made Kali Linux more user friendlyfriendly.
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kali disadvantages :

KALI is not as easy to use, because it’s penetration oriented, and it doesn’t even try to hold your hands. or molly coddle a newbie
KALI is not exactly the most training oriented Linux. You will need to find Wiki sources
In the process of using KALI for NORMAL computing, you may trash some of KALI’s specialized settings for it’s own security.

BackBox

BackBox is more than an operating system, it is a Free Open Source Community Project with the aim of promoting the culture of security in IT environment. It is all built with exclusively Free Open Source Software, demonstrating the potential and power of the Community. This distro is built on debian and ubuntu.

advantages :

Capability Set
Ease Of Use
Release Rate
Pricing And Support
API and Extensibility

disadvantage :

Bug Bounty Program
Learning Curve
Community support
surface attack probability

Parrot OS

Parrot OS is a Linux distribution based on Debian with a focus on security. One of the main advantages of Parrot OS compared to Kali Linux is that Parrot OS is lightweight. This means that it requires much less disk space and processing power to run effectively.

advantages:-

The theme of Parrot is sleek, and easy to navigate. Perfect for a hacking NewB
Has everything right where you need it. The menus are well organized.
Comes with anonymization services you can enable with one mouse click.

disadvantage:-

Must download important tools (such as snort) from repositories
Not minimalistic out of box, although that can be changed with a few GUI tweaks and a different wallpaper
Out of Box desktop is somewhat cluttered with shortcuts

BlackArch-linux

BlackArch is a penetration testing distribution based on Arch Linux that provides a large amount of cybersecurity tools. It is an open-source distro created especially for penetration testers and security researchers. The repository contains more than 2600 tools that can be installed individually or in groups.

advantages:

A great amount of tools come out of box and is well defined in a single page
BlackArch is designed for the pros in mind
Very very minimalistic
has a huge community support

disadvantage:

Not recommended for the NewB.
Kind of difficult to get used to if you're used to other distros.
Extensive knowledge of linux is preferred
needs a lot of linux knowledge and not user friendly

DEFT linux

DEFT (Digital Evidence & Forensic Toolkit) is a customised distribution of the Ubuntu live Linux CD. It is an easy-to-use system that includes excellent hardware detection and some of the best open-source applications dedicated to incident response and computer forensics.

advantages: