Linux is an excellent operating system for coders and hackers who want to ease their life at their job. It is stable, secure, fast, free, and most of all, ready for changes.
Linux is widely prevalent among hackers and programmers for a broad number of reasons, they sure do use other operating systems, but Linux gets all the popularity.
In this article, we are going to discuss Fifteen reasons why Hackers love to use Linux.
Bootable from a USB
You can boot Linux from literally any storage device, including USB and Disk Drives, without even installing it on the system.
This gives the hacker a chance to plug his USB containing a Linux operating system in the victim’s PC and gain access to it.
This includes easily manipulating the data stored on the victim’s disk, deleting it, replacing it, or copying it for future use.
In cases where users have not encrypted their data on the disk, the hacker can take advantage of a Linux plug and play USB to gain access to their data without cracking the password of their Operating system.
Bootable Linux USBs are easy to create and even available on Amazon for sale.
Other uses for a bootable Linux USB include recovering data from a locked system that you forgot the password of and trying a Linux system without installing it.
Designed for Hacking
There are Linux operating systems designed for the sole purpose of penetration testing and hacking. These operating systems come packed with hundreds of ready-to-go powerful tools designed for hacking.
Kali Linux and Parrot OS are the best examples. These operating systems are the first choice of any hacker since they come pre-configured with all the tools a hacker would ever need.
This saves many headaches that manually configuring the tools on an Operating system Like MacOs or Windows would have caused.
Free and Open Source
Linux is free and Open Source, making it the first choice of hackers. Instead of paying the big giants thousands of dollars, users can start their career in penetration testing by simply downloading a Linux OS.
This also gives them a choice if they wish to change between hundreds of other Linux operating systems available.
Being open-source Linux has an advantage in terms of user trust. Users can trust that their operating system is not recording their activities and sending them behind their backs to the corporate giants.
Moreover, since anyone can look into its code, the vulnerabilities get discovered and fixed by the community.
Linux Can Run Without GUI
Other operating systems like Mac and Windows require you to control the system through GUI only, while you can boot Linux without GUI.
This drops you at the Terminal, where you can easily control the system using commands, scripts, and keyboard only. It eliminates the need for a mouse and speeds up the work.
No GUI means faster booting time and easy remote control when Linux is used on devices like a Raspberry Pi.
In certain conditions, GUI is useless and adds up just to system load. One such situation is a hacker inserting a USB drive to execute a few scripts on the victim’s computer.
Availability of Hacking tools
There are thousands of tools on the internet made for penetration testing or hacking. Many of these tools are designed specifically for Linux and to work in the Terminal.
Although they can be ported and run on other operating systems, However Linux is the best supported.
This includes thousands of scripts and professional tools available in the market.
Moreover, unlike Windows, most tools can be installed directly from the Terminal with a single command. So why waste your time installing stuff while you can utilize it to do something productive? This is the reason why Hackers love Linux.
Terminal
The Linux Terminal is a powerful tool available for Linux users. It is similar to Command prompt in Windows but way more powerful.
It gives you total control over the system without needing to go through GUI.
I have mentioned Terminal many times before in this article since it is the biggest reason hackers love Linux.
You can install software through Terminal, make and run bash scripts to make your life easy and a lot more.
The Terminal can be used to automate tasks that would otherwise require human attention. It is easy to use and gives you a total overview of the task in progress.
All Linux hacking tools are available for Terminal, and some of them don’t even support the GUI. The reason is Terminal is powerful. It has features like curl, wget, ssh and much more than any Hacker would need.
Scripts
Bash scripts are a great way to automate tasks. In fact, many hacking software on Linux are bash scripts.
These scripts run directly through Terminal and can be programmed just like any other programming language.
Hackers can gain access to the victim’s system and remotely execute scripts that will act as a backdoor and provide access to the victim’s device to the hacker.
There are many other use cases for bash scripts; they can be used in IoT and make life easy with Linux.
One example of hackers using a bash script is automating attacks on a web server through a script, hence removing the need of manually attacking and giving the hacker more time and freeing resources to target others.
Total control over system
With Linux, you get total control over your system. You are the master of your system, unlike Windows and Mac, where you are just an administrator or user, respectively.
You can modify, change or remove any feature that you like. Hackers love to exercise control over the system since they can tweak Linux according to their needs.
This includes controlling installed software, monitoring its activities, intercepting them and modifying them if needed.
Remotely controllable
Linux is easier to control over the network than any other operating system. Users can install it on any device and control it over the internet using ssh tunnelling and similar methods.
As Linux does not force the user to use a GUI, it makes it easier to control the system over the network. Hence a hacker can plant a Raspberry Pi based camera that runs Linux to eavesdrop.
A similar method is used on web servers, where Linux is installed to run the webserver without a GUI and then accessed via SSH to control the system.
Secure / No Malware
Linux is a very secure operating system due to the Linux Kernel and its low market share. As a result, malware rarely targets Linux machines, and even when they do, it is usually corporate machines and not a user device.
This protects the hacker from getting malware himself. Quite ironic. On the other hand, this also allows them to protect their data from getting into the hands of Law agencies when caught.
This adds an extra layer of security, whereas other operating systems like Microsoft Windows may contain a backdoor and can never be trusted with security.
Encryption software available on Linux, which encrypt your whole disk during the installation itself, are another layer to protect the privacy and data of the hacker.
The vulnerabilities in Linux are low and frequent updates eliminate even those that were ever-present.
Friendly community
Linux is very popular among programmers and hackers, with a large community filled with tech experts. This makes it easy to get help on specific issues.
Linux is open source, and so are the most of software run on it. This allows the community to review the operating system and other open-source software for bad code and figure out bugs that can lead to security risks.
Hackers can get instant answers for their questions on community forums like Stackoverflow and Reddit.
Trustable with Logs
Logs are critical; they can prove the activities of a hacker if he is caught and access to his system is gained. Hence a hacker must clear every trace of the job he did from the victim’s computer and his own.
Hackers can not trust corporate software like Windows with such important jobs since they might secretly monitor user activity behind the back.
On Linux, all system logs are placed under a specific directory /var/logs/, which the hacker can clear with one command and delete logs created by other software. The hacker can design a script that will search, find and delete any log through the whole system.
Lightweight
Linux does not come with unnecessary bloatware, which adds up to slowing down the system.
It manages system resources efficiently and consumes just a fraction of the system CPU.
Linux can run on a ten-year-old computer with 500 MB RAM, making it perfect for a plug and play USB hack tool.
Ready for Changes
A hacker could change his operating system the way he wants to. For example, remove GUI completely to work with Terminal only or to replace the GUI entirely.
This means he can even make his own version of Linux ISO with custom tools and configurations pre-installed. Thus, Linux can be moulded the way hackers want it to.
A few examples of this are Kali Linux, ParrotOS and Tails. Kali Linux contains all the necessary tools for Penetration testing/hacking, while Tails is a very secure operating system that protects you from being tracked online.
Developer Friendly
Hackers are programmers too, and Linux is a very developer-friendly operating system. As a result, almost the whole Linux community is filled with developers.
With Linux, you get easy access to software and its updates. Moreover, any software can be installed from the official repository of the respective Linux operating system with one single command.
Developers can code directly in the Terminal using a text editor like Vim or Nano and compile their code in the Terminal since it supports hundreds of programming languages.
You can install support for any programming language and build tools in the Terminal.
Ease of access and increased productivity is what any hacker or programmer desires, making hackers love Linux.