Forum Thread: Why Use a Pentesting Distro ?

That you don't have to install some tools, basicly that's all there is to it, ye and they are handy as live usb. By the way I would suggest using something other than Ubuntu / Linux Mint, as Ubuntu keeps track of some things and Linux Mint was hacked and backdoored recently, I suggest Manjaro or Debian if you want to use a normal distro for hacking.

Wow, how can an entire distro be compromised ?

Somebody managed to point a download link in the website to a modified ISO that included a backdoor. This may, actually, happen to anybody. It was not a flaw in the distro but in the website.

Apparently that was detected and fixed the very next day it happened.

same as vftpd v2.3.4 but the backdoor was there for more than a year lmfao

It comes down to your preference. A pentest distro has all the tools pre installed and you dont have to deal with installing them. However most people prefeer a empty distro and to only put the tools they want. Most hackers get comfortable with certian tools and why have the unessicary tools. Refeering to the car analergy, most car enthusiests replace heavy metal parts with carbon fibre, yeah a pre baught race car may be what you wqnt but if you want to be the best youll price it all out do your homework and choose the lest costly option for the best results.

Just some food for thaught its really all preference. I reccomend do some research, and pick whats best for you. I started with Kali linux, and realised that I wanted to have my own. If some one wants to hack say hackers like nsa or some other acronimed thing like that they will target pentest distros at least I would.

Also Linux mint's reason for being hacked was due to a vulnerability in wordpress was picked up nice and early.

I suggested Manjaro, because Manjaro is compatible with BlackArch. You can add BlackArch repositories to Manjaro and install the tools you need using the pacman or, with the BlackArch variant, blackman and use that to download your tools. While I don't advice using the hacking OS also as your daily OS it should be OK if you stick to trying hacking in a controlled environment (Within LAN).

I would like to use this chance to point out that Kali Linux is NOT supposed to be used as a daily OS. Especially not as root.

Mostly because its tools are preinstalled and preconfigured. but I prefer arch.