Last updated: January 1, 2023
If you are a pentester, a Bug Bounty bounty hunter, a security researcher or simply a fan of ethical hacking, it is very likely that you already know that certain Linux distributions are specially designed for this. There is a wide choice of distribution designed to keep our geek spirit satisfied.
It all started with distributions like backbox, Blackarch, a few others… Then, Kali linux has emerged and the world of security has changed greatly.
It is the community's preferred operating system, even Mr. Robot is shown to use it. Kali has a lot of cool things, a great community… It's like the perfect sword in the hands of an ultimate warrior.
I've been using Kali Linux formerly called Backtrack for 6 years and thought it was my favorite distro until I got my hands on Parrot OS. And since then I've loved it a little more every day. It has all the features that Kali lacks or is difficult to implement.
What is Parrot? OS?
Parrot OS is a GNU/Linux distribution focused on computer security based on Debian and with the MATE desktop environment. It is developed by the Frozenbox team.
The objective of Parrot Security OS is to provide a distribution grouping together all the tools necessary for IT security tests. It contains all the tools you need to be a perfect hacker.
Among these tools, we find:
- TOR to surf anonymously and to access the darknet,
- Sqlmap to detect and exploit SQL flaws,
- John ripper to do dictionary "password" attacks,
- Maltego to collect information about a person, etc.
- Metasploit to exploit vulnerabilities in computer systems and software
- Nmap to detect open ports, identify hosted services, and obtain information about a remote computer's operating system
- Ethercap to snort and analyze a computer network
- fern wifi cracker to hack your neighbor's wifi network
- The Harvester for retrieve email addresses and also the subdomains linked to a website.
Reasons why I prefer Parrot:
- Appearance: although the choice of appearance is personal, I can't argue with the fact that it's better than kali.
- Anonymity with Anon Surf: If you are doing something mean and want to be anonymous, you can do it with one click. Anrot Surf is preinstalled and configured for the parrot.
- Programming environment: we have everything we need to develop our own software. Parrot comes with a bunch of text editor, it uses pluma as the default text editor, much better than Gedit.
- Many more tools: just like Kali, Parrot comes with a lot of tools... but if you see the sections, there are a lot of other tools that are not in kali, like Automative, Sys Service, etc. This is one of my favorite important features on Parrot, because tools make life easier, and at Parrot there is no shortage of tools.
Note that there is also a version Cloud, which is installed on a server of your own and which allows you to use all the tools of Parrot Security OS remotely and anywhere
You can download Parrot Security OS on their new beautiful site or on Sourceforge. Hope you enjoy this distro.