Here is the list of Top 15 Best Operating Systems used by Hackers and Pentesters to find bugs and vulnerabilities. These operating systems are easy to install and comes with a user-friendly interface. Hacking tools like Metasploit, Nmap, John the Ripper, Burp suite e.t.c are preinstalled on these Hacking operating systems.
Almost every Hacking OS is based on Linux, because Linux is a free and open source operating system, it is easy to modify and tweak. Programmers and hackers can easily modify the Linux source code to build a dedicated pen testing operating system like Kali Linux and Parrot OS. Windows and MAC OS also can be used for hacking but the problem is they are controlled by companies and you never know which line of code has been written to track you down. In this article, you will see the list of best Linux for hacking.
Also Read: Best Linux distro for gaming.
Disclaimer: use them for educational purposes only. Geekviews don’t promote malicious practices
Best Operating Systems used by Hackers
Let’s see 15 best Linux distro for hacking or you can say best pentesting distro for hacking purposes.
#1 Kali Linux: Best Hacking OS.
Kali Linux is funded and maintained by Offensive Security Ltd. Based on Debian It is the favorite Operating system of hackers because Kali Linux has been built keeping beginners in mind. It has the easiest User interface with 600 preinstalled hacking tools like Wireshark, Nmap, Jonh the Ripper, and Aircrack-ng, Kali linux is one the most famous and Best operating Systems used by Hackers backed by massive online guides and resources to get start with it.
It was developed by Mati Aharoni and Devon Kearns of Offensive Security through the rewrite of BackTrack using a secure environment, only a small number of trusted people are allowed commit packages, with each package being signed by the developer. You can call it the hacking operating system.
Download Kali Linux.
Also Read: How to install Kali Linux on Virtual Box.
Also Read: How to dual boot windows 10 and Kali Linux.
#2 Parrot Security OS: Best Hacking OS.
Parrot Security OS (or ParrotSec) is based on Debian GNU/LINUX. It is a mixture of Kali Linux and Frozen box OS. Penetration testing like Vulnerability Assessment, Mitigation, Computer Forensics and Anonymous Surfing can be easily done by using Parrot Security OS. Developed by the Frozen box Dev Team it has its own dedicated repo for storing the custom packets but ParrotSec also uses Kali repositories for updating its tools. Parrot Security OS is easy to customize and has a large online community support which makes it 2nd in our list of best Hacking Os or Best operating Systems used by Hackers.
Download Parrot Security OS
#3 BACKBOX: Best Hacking OS.
BackBox is a Linux Distro for Hackers based on Ubuntu it Comes with a complete set of tools required for hacking and security testing. It includes some of the most used security and analysis Linux tools, aiming for a wide spread of goals, ranging from web application analysis to network analysis, from stress tests to sniffing, also including vulnerability assessment, computer forensic analysis, and exploitation. BackBox fast and easy to use Linux distro with a complete desktop environment which makes it Best operating Systems used by Hackers.
Download BackBox Linux
#4 Pentoo Linux: Best Hacking OS.
Pentoo is a Live CD and Live USB designed for penetration testing and security assessment. Based on Gentoo Linux, Pentoo is provided both as 32 and 64-bit installable LiveCD. Pentoo is also available as an overlay for an existing Gentoo installation. It features packet injection patched wifi drivers, GPGPU cracking software, and lots of tools for penetration testing and security assessment. The Pentoo kernel includes security and PAX hardening and extra patches – with binaries compiled from a hardened toolchain with the latest nightly versions of some tools available.
Download Pentoo Linux
#5 Samurai Web Testing Framework: Best Hacking OS.
The Samurai Web Testing Framework is basically live Linux environment that has been pre-configured to work as a web pen-testing environment. It contains the best of the open source and free hacking tools that focus on detecting vulnerabilities and attacking websites. You can call it the best operating system for Web Penetration Testing.
Download Samurai Web Testing Framework
#6 DEFT Linux: Best Hacking OS.
Digital Evidence and Forensic Toolkit i.e Deft is an open source Linux distribution Digital Evidence and Forensic Toolkit. Deft has been built around the DART (Digital Advanced Response Toolkit) software. It’s based on Ubuntu and comes with many popular forensic hacking tools.
Download DEFT Linux
#8 Network Security Toolkit: Best Hacking OS.
The Network Security Toolkit (NST) is a Linux-based Live CD that provides a set of open source computer security and networking tools to perform routine security and networking diagnostic and monitoring tasks. The distribution can be used as a network security analysis, validation and monitoring tool on servers hosting virtual machines. The majority of tools published in the article “Top 125 security tools” by Insecure.org are available in the toolkit. NST has package management capabilities similar to Fedora and maintains its own repository of additional packages.
Features: Many tasks that can be performed within NST are available through a web interface called NST WUI. Among the tools that can be used through this interface are nmap with the visualization tool ZenMap, ntop, a Network Interface Bandwidth Monitor, a Network Segment ARP Scanner, a session manager for VNC, a minicom-based terminal server, serial port monitoring, and WPA-PSK management.Other features include visualization of ntopng, ntop, Wireshark, traceroute, NetFlow and kismet data by geolocating the host addresses, IPv4 Address conversation, traceroute data and wireless access points and displaying them via Google Earth or a Mercator World Map bit image, a browser-based packet capture and protocol analysis system capable of monitoring up to four network interfaces using Wireshark, as well as a Snort-based intrusion detection system with a “collector” backend that stores incidents in a MySQL database. For web developers, there is also a JavaScript console with a built-in object library with functions that aid the development of dynamic web pages.
Download NST
#9 Caine:Best Hacking OS.
Caine is an Ubuntu-based distro for ethical hacking comes with a lot of hacking tools for database, memory, forensics, and network analysis applications. You can also use Caine as a normal OS because it consists all the features like web browsers, email clients, document editors etc. for usual computing purposes.
Download Caine
#10 Matriux Linux: Best Hacking OS.
Matriux is powerful hacking Os based on Debian it comes with 300 pen testing tools to perform various tasks like cyber forensics investigations, vulnerability analysis, system and network administration, penetration testing, ethical hacking e.t.c. Besides hacking and pen testing, you can also use it as day to day OS.
Download Matriux
#11 BlackBuntu: Best Hacking OS.
BlackBuntu is a distribution for penetration testing which was specially designed for security training students and practitioners of information security. BlackBuntu is penetration testing distribution with GNOME Desktop Environment. It’s currently being built using the Ubuntu 10.10 and work on reference BackTrack
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#12 Cyborg Hawk Linux: Best Hacking OS.
It is one of the most advanced, powerful and yet beautiful Ubuntu based hacking os created by the team of Ztrela Knowledge Solutions Pvt. Ltd. Lined up with the ultimate collection of tools for pro Ethical Hackers and Cyber Security Experts. With over 700+ tools Pentesting and bug hunting will be easy when you use CYBORG HAWK LINUX.
Download CYBORG HAWK LINUX
#13 KNOPPIX: Best Hacking OS.
KNOPPIX is an operating system based on Debian designed to be run directly from a USB flash drive (Live USB), one of the first of its kind for any operating system. Knoppix was developed by, and named after, Linux consultant Klaus Knopper. When starting a program, it is loaded from the removable medium and decompressed into a RAM drive. The decompression is transparent and on-the-fly.
Although KNOPPIX is primarily designed to be used as a Live CD, it can also be installed on a hard disk like a typical operating system. Computers that support booting from USB devices can load KNOPPIX from a live USB flash drive or memory card.
Download KNOPPIX
#14 Bugtraq: Best Hacking OS.
Bugtraq is an electronic mailing list dedicated to issues about computer security. On-topic issues are new discussions about vulnerabilities, vendor security-related announcements, methods of exploitation, and how to fix them. It is a high-volume mailing list, and almost all new vulnerabilities are discussed there.Bugtraq team is experienced freaks and developers, It is available in Debian, Ubuntu, and OpenSUSE in 32 and 64-bit architectures.
Download Bugtraq
#15 BlackArch Linux:Best Hacking OS.
BlackArch Linux is an Arch-derived Linux distribution designed for penetration testing and security research. It may be used as a standalone live CD or live USB, run from a virtual machine, or be installed to a computer’s hard disk. It is also possible to add its Arch Linux unofficial repo to an existing installation of Arch Linux. It offers over 1700 tools organized by category, for security and forensic specialists
Download BlackArch Linux
Also Read: How to perform man in the middle attack to hack facebook
