Kali Linux Certification Course: Hacking with Kali Linux

Explore Kali Linux, a Debian-based distribution built for high-level penetration testing and security auditing, featuring more than 500 built-in tools for scanning, forensics, and ethical hacking.

Compare Unix and Linux: Unix at Bell Labs with a paid model, Mac OS as a Unix example, and Linux as a free, GPL open-source clone with Ubuntu and Debian.

Discover why Kali Linux excels for cyber security: it is free, highly customizable, and includes more than 500 built-in penetration testing tools, with multi-language support and inbuilt wireless drivers.

Download Kali Linux from kali.org, choosing virtual machines, bare metal, cloud, or live images. Select 64-bit or 32-bit based on your system; note default credentials are Kali username and password.

Explore Kali Linux installation types, from bootable USB live sessions and write-once CDs to dual-boot setups, with virtualization recommended for beginners to protect your main system.

Learn to set up virtual machines with Oracle VirtualBox, creating a Linux Debian 64-bit guest and a dynamic hard disk, then start, mount an ISO, clone, or remove VMs.

Create and configure a Kali Linux virtual machine from an ISO, run a graphical install, set the host name and root password, and explore basic tools and networking.

Explore the Kali Linux terminal basics and learn essential commands: ifconfig for interfaces and the IP address, apt-get for updates, and using && to chain commands.

Learn to use uname to fetch hardware and software information in Kali Linux, exploring options -a, -m, -p, -o and --help to display operating system details in a VM.

Learn the ls command to list root contents, distinguish folders, files, and executables, reveal hidden items with -a, and use -l for permissions, owner, size, and date, plus date command.

Master essential Linux commands for navigation and file management with cd, ls, touch, and cat, including moving between directories, creating blank files, and reading data.

Learn essential Linux commands for beginners, including clear, touch, ls, mkdir, rmdir, rm, and rm -rf, to create, list, and delete files and directories.

Copy files with the cp command by specifying the source and a destination, such as /root/downloads. Use mv to move files, and pwd to display your present working directory.

Use the mv command to move or rename files, then use locate to find files by name across the system, as shown with passwd and user.txt examples.

Learn to zip and unzip files using the zip and unzip commands, create archives, unzip to a specific directory with the -d option, and verify results with ls.

Locate Linux command binaries with where is, view paths for ls and cat, and manage history using history, the up arrow, and !n; clear history with history -c.

Learn to create a new user with add user, set passwords, switch between users with su, verify your session with who am i, and understand root versus standard prompts.

Explore the chmod change mode command to set file and folder permissions for admin, group, and others, using r, w, x or numeric values like 7, 5, and 4.

Learn how to check and set permissions in Kali Linux using ls -l, covering user, group, others, and both symbolic and numeric chmod approaches.

Apply the recursive -R option to set permissions for a folder and all its contents, such as 777 for admin group and other users.

Master essential Linux shortcuts for the terminal, including with ctrl-l to clear, ctrl-c to kill, ctrl-z to stop, ctrl-a and ctrl-e to move, and ctrl-shift-c/ctrl-shift-v to copy and paste.

Explore anonymity and why true 100% untraceability isn't possible, and learn legal privacy tools like proxy servers, VPNs, Tor, and IP address changers.

Explore how a proxy server hides the real user identity and enables access to blocked websites through a firewall, illustrated by a real-world example.

Compare VPN and proxy and explain that VPN uses encryption to create a secure, encrypted tunnel between you and the website, protecting you from your ISP, government agencies, and hackers.

Learn to set up a free OpenVPN on Kali Linux using VPN Book, download a file, and connect via TCP with a username and password for a secure VPN.

Explore how Tor, the onion router, anonymizes traffic by routing through three or more proxies, and distinguish surface web, deep web, and dark web.

Learn how to publish a website by linking a domain to hosting, configuring DNS records like A records and NS, and using Tor for onion sites on the dark web.

Demonstrates how Tor routes a user request through entry, middle, and exit relays. Explains how the exit decrypts the request to reveal only the destination and introduces proxy chains.

Learn how proxychains in Kali Linux route any application's tcp connections through a chain of proxies, including Tor or HTTP/HTTPS, and how to install Tor and proxychains if absent.

Learn how to temporarily change your mac address (mac spoofing) in kali linux by downing the interface, setting a new ether address, and bringing it up; changes are not permanent.

Use macchanger, a pre-built Kali tool, to view and change a network interface's MAC address, including show, set random or manual addresses, and reset to the original with sudo.

Learn footprinting by collecting target information to tailor an attack, including host, services, ports, IPs, subdomains, emails, and registrar details using the Kali Dimitri tool.

Explore DNS enumeration to reveal a domain’s DNS records, including A records, name servers, and mail exchange, and learn to use DNS enum in Kali for target mapping.

Discover how DNSenum on Kali Linux reveals name servers, A records, and mail servers for google.com, demonstrates load balancing concepts, and performs a brute force attack using dns.txt.

Discover how to use nmap to map networks, find live hosts and services, scan IP ranges, and analyze ports, OS details, and MAC addresses in Kali Linux.

Explore offline exploit searching in Kali Linux using search exploit against exploit db, with -E for exact matches like Windows 10, and locate OpenSSH, Android, and SQL injection exploits.

Explore website footprinting with whatweb to identify technology and server details, and use whois for domain information, then demonstrate using wordlists to reveal hidden files and folders.

Explore vulnerability assessment with Red Hawk, an all-in-one PHP tool for information gathering and vulnerability scanning, including whois, nmap port scans, DNS lookups, subdomain searches, SQLi, and WordPress checks.

Master database assessment using sqlmap in Kali Linux to detect and exploit SQL injection flaws, identify databases, tables, and columns, and retrieve usernames, passwords, and emails from vulnerable databases.

Learn about password attacks, and how hashing differs from encryption as a one-way process that cannot be decrypted, with passwords stored as hashes on servers.

Explore how plain text becomes a 32-character MD5 hash, why hashes can't be reversed, and how services like Facebook or Gmail store and verify passwords by hashing.

Identify the hash type with hash identifier in Kali, then generate and compare possible passwords by hashing them to match the database hash, without decrypting.

Explore how to crack passwords using the online tool Find my hash, generate md5 hashes, and run Python scripts from Kali Linux, including cloning the repository and troubleshooting commands.

Create a custom word list with a Kali built-in Ruby tool that spiders a url to a chosen depth, scans for password candidates, and saves results to a password list.txt.

Learn how crunch generates a custom word list in Kali by defining minimum and maximum lengths and a character set, with output options to screen or file.

Learn to crack md5 hashes of any file using John the Ripper, by creating a hash file, specifying raw-md5 format, and exploring the tool’s options.

Demonstrates offline password cracking on Kali Linux using John the Ripper against the shadow file, showing how hashes are matched with a word list to reveal root and user passwords.

Learn how to crack a password from a password-protected zip by extracting its hash with zip to John, using a wordlist, and performing a dictionary attack with John the Ripper.

Learn to perform offline password cracking with Hydra in Kali Linux, using its GUI to attack an SSH service on Metasploitable II with word lists, verbosity, and credential testing.

Use Medusa in Kali Linux to perform a fast, modular login brute force attack, supplying host, username, and a password word list with the SSH module to crack credentials offline.

Learn sniffing and spoofing by capturing network packets—encrypted or plain text—and analyzing them with tools like Wireshark, which can act as a man-in-the-middle.

Use Wireshark to capture packets and inspect http traffic, revealing usernames and passwords in plain text, and learn that https encrypts data via ssl; always use https for sensitive info.

Wireshark captures packets from all machines on the same interface, as shown with Kali and Windows 10 on Ethernet zero; it continues capturing and reveals packet data from the network.

Demonstrate how spoofing uses fake data to impersonate a legitimate source and redirect DNS requests to an attacker's page while the URL remains the same.

Configure Ettercap for unified sniffing, scan hosts, and target a Windows 7 machine; enable DNS spoofing and ARP poisoning, then edit the DNS file to point microsoft.com at 10.0.2.15.

Learn essential wireless attack terms, including WPA/WPA2 and WEP, pre-shared keys, SSID and ESSID, MAC addresses, RF mode, IEEE 802.11, and Wi‑Fi channels.

Explore wireless attacks with Kali Linux, using aircrack-ng to crack WEP by setting monitor mode, collecting packets, saving a cap file, and recovering the password.

Explore how to crack WPA and WPA2 security using Kali Linux tools like aircrack-ng, including capturing handshakes and executing dictionary attacks against target networks.

Demonstrates using a wireless attack tool in Kali Linux, enabling monitor mode on wlan0, scanning for access points, selecting a target, and cracking passwords with a dictionary while capturing handshakes.

Explore the Metasploit framework in Kali Linux, an open source tool for exploits against remote targets, and use the MSF console to search android exploits and manage payloads.

Discover a buffer overflow attack using Metasploit against Windows XP SP3, configuring a reverse TCP Meterpreter payload from Kali to gain post-exploitation access on a target machine.

Showcases browser exploitation using beef, a browser exploitation framework for client-side attacks. Install, configure, and run beef on Kali, start Apache, and test online and offline browsers.

BeEF demonstrates how browser exploits enable targeted attacks, including social engineering, fake update prompts, phishing, and spoofed address bars on Windows targets.

Learn sql injection with the j sql GUI to reveal databases, tables, and user data from a test URL, illustrating live database access and tool comparisons to sqlmap.

Demonstrates performing a MySQL injection attack using the SQL SSAs tool on Kali Linux, including setting up, generating a configuration file, and extracting database tables and user data.

Learn to install Windows 10 in VirtualBox using an ISO or a preconfigured virtual machine. The walkthrough covers creating a virtual machine, storage setup, and custom installation for penetration testing.

Use VirtualBox snapshots to restore a Windows 7 VM during pen testing, then install Windows 7 from an ISO, configure storage, and set up user and network settings.

Install Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.3 from boot media, configure language, network, and hostname, and set root and user passwords, while selecting server with gui for post-installation setup.

Master the terminal as the interface between user and system, learn how commands translate to machine language, view hostname, and navigate using pwd and tilde home paths.

Learn how ssh enables secure remote access, verify host fingerprints, and manage connections across local and virtual machines using known_hosts.

Learn to replace password-based ssh authentication with RSA key pair authentication by generating keys with ssh-keygen, copying the public key to the server with ssh-copy-id, and enabling passwordless login.

install rhel server on your virtual machine, connect to it via ssh with or without password, and explore what the terminal is and how to open it.

Chapter 8 covers Vim text editor basics, the Linux directory structure, and working with files, then explores user and group management, permissions, and processes, with a summary of part two.

Master Vim, the VI improved editor in Linux, enter insert mode with A, I, or O, then press Escape and save with :wq!

Practice vim by creating a file in your home directory, switching between insert and command modes, and using essential editing, deletion, undo, paste, replace globally, and navigate commands.

Explore the Linux directory structure from root to essential folders like /bin, /boot, /dev, /lib, /home, and /var, and learn how mounting and system files support boot and operation.

Learn basic linux file creation and manipulation with cat and touch, view and count content with head, tail, and wc, and manage copies, moves, and deletions with cp, mv, rm.

Explore advanced user management tasks in Kali Linux, including locking and unlocking accounts, adding users to secondary groups, renaming accounts, and creating or changing UIDs, with verification via id.

Create a secondary group for Robin and Harry. Add both users to it and inspect /etc/group, /etc/passwd, /etc/shadow; use id -G and id -g.

Manage user password properties with the password command, lock or unlock passwords, set maximum lifetime of a password and minimum lifetime, and specify warning days, as demonstrated with Harry’s account.

this chapter explains linux ownership—user, group, and others—and how permissions appear as rwx triplets, using a home directory example and the check order: owner, then group, then others.

Inspect current ownership and groups in home directories, then use chgrp to assign staff and sales groups and chown to assign heads of departments as owners, before adjusting permissions.

Learn the basics of Linux permissions: read, write, and execute for files and directories, including how read on a directory lists contents and execute enables entering directories.

Learn to use chmod to set basic file and directory permissions, interpreting digits (read 4, write 2, execute 1) for user, group, and others; compare absolute and relative modes.

Explore spatial permissions in Kali Linux, including set user ID and set group ID, which let executables run as owner or group, and set group ID on directories.

Explore special permissions in linux: set user ID, set group ID, and the sticky bit, with practical usage, safe vs dangerous scenarios, and how absolute and relative modes affect chmod.

Understand how the sticky bit restricts file deletion in shared directories, permitting only the directory owner or parental owner to delete, demonstrated in the staff directory and /tmp.

Explore access control lists for directory permissions, using setfacl to grant the sales group read access to the staff directory and set default ACLs for new items.

Explore how startup services run automatically at boot, observe them with ps aux | wc to count, and clarify the difference between jobs and processes in the shell.

Master Linux process management by using shell jobs, bg/fg, ctrl-z, and kill variants; catalog processes with ps and top, and monitor memory and CPU usage.

Master essential Linux skills, from using Vim and navigating the Linux directory structure to executing basic commands, managing processes, and handling basic and special permissions.

Learn to get Linux command help with hyphen hyphen help and man pages, use man -k, understand sections one, five, eight, and master globbing and input, output, and error redirection.

Explore installing and managing packages with rpm and yum, including handling dependencies, configuring repositories, and querying package information on Linux.

Explore hard links and symbolic links, and how inodes relate to files. Hard links share data blocks within a partition, and symbolic links point to targets across partitions.

Master tar for backups and archival in Linux, creating, compressing, extracting, listing, and appending tar archives with gzip and bzip2 formats.

Discover how Linux logs create a troubleshooting timeline, manage log files with rsyslog and journalctl, and view messages via systemd journal, available at /run/log/journal.

Master journalctl usage for boot logs, errors, recent events, and disk usage, then understand logrotate basics like weekly rotation, copies, compression, and cron triggers.

Lvm, the logical volume manager and device mapper target for the Linux kernel, enables flexible storage with root file systems on logical volumes and spanning disks with easy resizing.

learn to create partitions and configure lvm by making physical volumes, volume groups, and logical volumes, then format, mount, and resize filesystems using ext4, df, and fstab.

Shrink an ext4 file system by unmounting, running e2fsck, and resizing, then reduce the logical volume and remount to reclaim space.

Learn to schedule recurring and one-time tasks in Linux using cron and at, including editing crontab and understanding minute, hour, day of month, month, and day of week fields.

Explore how kernels power Windows, Mac, and Linux, and how modules extend functionality, with lsmod and udevadm monitor to observe USB hardware events.

Install the httpd package with yum, configure the apache web server, explore httpd.conf, conf.d, and conf.modules.d, then start and enable httpd, and verify a basic index.html via firefox.

Boot to the grub menu, append rd.break to the linux line, enter a root shell, remount /sysroot as rw, chroot to sysroot, set a new root password, touch .autorelabel for SELinux, and reboot.

Master vim search and highlighting hlsearch, navigate with ; and , for chars and / for words; explore visual modes—character, line, and block—and macros with q and replay with @.

Explore vim settings and buffers, learn to customize vim with vimrc, use set options like hlsearch, number, and backup, manage buffers and multiple files with commands.

Describe three terminal opening methods and create vim file named student. Show first eight lines of /etc/passwd and last five lines of /etc/shadow; copy into directories; rename a folder.

Learn how to use Vim effectively by accessing built-in help, navigating normal, visual, and insert modes, performing substitutions, joining lines, and using grep to locate commands.

Create and manage users and groups for sysadmin, set passwords, restrict Harry's shell, configure /common/admin with group sysadmin, automate a daily cron job, and manage /var/tmp/fstab permissions.

Create a sysadmin group and three users with distinct shells and passwords, copy /etc/fstab to /tmp, set up /common/admin with 2770, schedule a cron job, and apply acl permissions.

Create a 400 MB ext4 partition mounted at /common, add user neo with uid 1337 and set password; search root in /etc/passwd to /home/search, and back up /etc to /home/backup.tar.bz2.

Create a partition on /dev/sdb, format as ext4, mount to /common, and verify with df -h; add user neo with uid 1337; grep root from /etc/passwd > /search/file; tar /etc.

Explore handy Linux commands by demoing rev, factor, and yes, and learn why forkbomb is dangerous as it can exhaust system resources, with a practical try-it-yourself demonstration.

Complete this beginner-focused Kali Linux course and message me with any queries for a quick reply, or request a coupon code to secure the maximum discount amid occasional price changes.