Gaming So, I'm setting up a pentesting Linux installation

[Nimbus]

So, I've decided to make myself a dedicated pentesting Linux installation for various fun uses. No I am not a black-hat sort of guy, I promise.

At first, I was going to use Backtrack, but unfortunently it doesn't support EXT4, which is what I use on all my drives. Mounting my /home partition for Ubuntu as ext3 is a recipe for disaster in my case.

So, I was thinking of using an RPM distro like Fedora, and adding in the applications commonly found on Backtrack. I did find the Fedora Security Spin, but it doesn't seem to have an installer, which would be great if I was going to run it from the Live CD, but that is not what I'm going to do.

I'm still keen on using Fedora, since my Wireless card has always been easy to set-up when I've used it, but I wanted to ask everybody else what distro they think would be best for this purpose. Again, I don't want to use my existing Ubuntu install for this purpose, I'd rather have a seperate distro for this use.

Also, Debian is not an option, getting my Wireless card setup is way too much of a hassle, and the kernels outdated as well.

 

[FAST6191]

I am not as well versed in pen test as I might be so I might well have to bow out as things get more interesting.
The main thing that I want to ask though is what kind of thing are you planning thinking towards things like forensic grade disc mounting- if we are going true spy vs spy grade you do not want to say be leaving mounted/accessed on dates all over the drive (especially journalled filesystems) and that is something of a deviation from the standard linux setups (indeed even backtrack has had some issues with it if I recall the changelogs) that will at least probe a drive even if they do not automount it or even do something very silly like use the swap. Granted this is probably one of those cases where we get to split hairs between what is forensics and what is pen testing.

Likewise "since my Wireless card"- granted I have nothing to go on but can you check if your card is capable of wireless attacks. Half the fun of pen test stuff is network related (indeed I believe it is still the case that if you are standing over the machine you own it) and lacking a capable card you will not get far- even if you do not plan on cracking wireless networks some of the more exotic methods require nice inject techniques. Such cards cost very little these days too.

Also if you are shying away from some of the more fun network stuff have you considered virtualising such a distribution- this should lessen your hardware issues on all fronts. I can see how this would be too close to liveCD though and I am not sure how well it would cope with stuff like DCHP exhaustion attacks.

Afraid I have not answered any of your questions but hopefully you have something to think about.