Install BackTrack Tools in Ubuntu

UPDATE [11-7-2010]: It is *best* to use the actual BackTrack distribution due to the patches and optimizations they make to the kernel. Patching the standard Ubuntu kernel would make it no longer *Ubuntu*. I’d highly suggest you either:

1. Install BackTrack on a real or virtual machine environment
2. Manually download and install the security tools you need to use on your system.

—————————-

NOTE: I have posted a more comprehensive guide to installing BackTrack 4 tools within Ubuntu that will also install the correct menu structure and fixes the problem where some commands would not launch from the menu.

You really should follow the above guide. It is more accurate and more comprehensive than the guide on this page.

If you plan to use BackTrack for penetration testing, I *highly* recommend these 2 books as well:

            

===============

BackTrack belongs in every penetration tester’s or security engineer’s toolbox. With the release of BT4, it is now based on Ubuntu, and therefore supports Debian based packages.

As described by the developers:

BackTrack is the most top rated Linux live distribution focused on penetration testing. With no installation whatsoever, the analysis platform is started directly from the CD-Rom and is fully accessible within minutes.

It’s evolved from the merge of the two wide spread distributions – Whax and Auditor Security Collection. By joining forces and replacing these distributions, BackTrack has gained massive popularity and was voted in 2006 as the #1 Security Live Distribution by insecure.org. Security professionals as well as new-comers are using BackTrack as their favorite toolset all over the globe.

One of my test systems is running Ubuntu 9.04, and I don’t want to wipe it to install all the great open-source tools that come on the BackTrack Live DVD. Luckily, it is possible to automate the installation of all of BT4′s utilities within Ubuntu. Let’s get started…

Let’s begin by launching a root bash shell by typing:

sudo bash

The next step is to add the BackTrack repositories to your apt-get sources.list file:

1. Add the Backtrack repository:

echo deb http://repo.offensive-security.com/dist/bt4 binary/ >> /etc/apt/sources.list

2. Import the Backtrack PGP key and update your sources (and set a proxy server to use if you need it):

export http_proxy="http://myproxyserver.com:8080"
wget http://repo.offensive-security.com/dist/bt4/binary/public-key && sudo apt-key add public-key && sudo aptitude update

3. Build your package list (NOTE that I am specifying a proxy server — remove this part from the command if you do not use a proxy):

links -http-proxy myproxyserver.com:8080 -dump http://repo.offensive-security.com/dist/bt4/binary/ | awk '{print $3}' | grep -i deb | cut -d . -f 1 > backtrack.txt

If you do not use a proxy server, then the command will look like this:

links -dump http://repo.offensive-security.com/dist/bt4/binary/ | awk '{print $3}' | grep -i deb | cut -d . -f 1 > backtrack.txt

4. Install packages:

for i in $(cat backtrack.txt); do sudo aptitude -y install $i; done

Sit back and wait for the install to complete. (Credit for these steps goes to the SecLogic Applied Security blog.)

Next, we need to run a Perl script to ensure that the newly installed applications can be correctly executed from our GNOME Applications menu.

Copy the following code and save it to a file. I saved mine to a file called UpdateBTMenu.pl

#!/usr/bin/perl
#
##
# Written by Mick Grove
# http://micksmix.wordpress.com
#
#  [v0.1]		11/20/2009
##
#
# BSD Licensed
#
#       Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
#       modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are
#       met:
#
#       * Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
#         notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
#       * Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above
#         copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer
#         in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the
#         distribution.
#       * Neither the name of the  nor the names of its
#         contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from
#         this software without specific prior written permission.
#
#       THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS
#       "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT
#       LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR
#       A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT
#       OWNER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL,
#       SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT
#       LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE,
#       DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY
#       THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT
#       (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE
#       OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.
#
#
use strict;
use warnings;
use Tie::File;

my $dir     = "/usr/local/share/applications";
my $section = "Desktop Entry";
my $in_section;
my @files;

opendir(BIN, $dir) or die "Can't open $dir: $!";
while (defined(my $file = readdir BIN))
{
    next if $file =~ /^\.\.?$/;    # skip . and ..
    if ($file =~ m/.*\.desktop$/i)
    {
        push(@files, $file);
    }
}
closedir(BIN);

foreach my $curfile (@files)
{
    open( FH, "<", "$dir/$curfile" ) or die "$!";
    chomp( my @fileparts = <FH> );

    my $termval = TerminalStatus(\@fileparts);
    next if $termval == 0;    # skip if this is not a terminal application

    #lets see if this is actually a BT program
    my $btprogram = IsBTProgram(\@fileparts);
    next if $btprogram == 0;    # skip if this is not a BT application

    my $ExecKey     = "Exec";
    my $TerminalKey = "Terminal";
    my @tiedfile;

    #open this file for editing
    tie @tiedfile, 'Tie::File', "$dir/$curfile" or die "$!";

    #read file line by line here
    # updating "Exec" line
    foreach my $fline (@tiedfile)
    {
        next if $fline =~ /^#/;       # skip comments
        next if $fline =~ /^\s*$/;    # skip empty lines

        if ($fline =~ /^\[$section\]$/)
        {
            $in_section = 1;
            next;
        }

        if ($fline =~ /^\[/)
        {
            $in_section = 0;
            next;
        }

        my $oldline;
        my $updatedline;
        if ($in_section and $fline =~ /^$ExecKey\s*=\s*(.*)$/)
        {

            # this means we have the "Exec key"
            $oldline = $1;
            next if $oldline =~ m/^.*xterm -e.*;bash.*$/i;    #skip
            $oldline =~ s/"/\\"/img;
            $updatedline = "Exec=xterm -e \"$oldline;bash\"";
            $fline       = $updatedline;

            print "New exec: " . $fline . "\n";
            next;
        }
        elsif ($in_section and $fline =~ /^$TerminalKey\s*=\s*(.*)$/)
        {

            # this means we have the "Terminal key"
            # we will set it to "0" to turn it off --- we are launching
            #   xterm ourselves, if we set to 1, we'll get an extra
            #   terminal opened
            #
            $oldline     = $1;
            $updatedline = "Terminal=0";
            $fline       = $updatedline;
            next;
        }

    }
    untie @tiedfile;
}

print "\n\nAll menu entries have been updated\n";

###
### Subroutines ###
###
sub TerminalStatus
{
    my @lines       = @{$_[0]};
    my $TerminalKey = "Terminal";
    my $ExecKey     = "Exec";
    my $termkeyval  = 0;            #default = 0 FALSE, 1= TRUE
    my $i           = 0;
    my $execkeyval = 0;  #default = 0 = this exec line probably wasn't set by us

    foreach my $fline (@lines)
    {
        next if $fline =~ /^#/;       # skip comments
        next if $fline =~ /^\s*$/;    # skip empty lines

        if ($fline =~ /^\[$section\]$/)
        {
            $in_section = 1;
            next;
        }

        if ($fline =~ /^\[/)
        {
            $in_section = 0;
            next;
        }

        if ($in_section and $fline =~ /^$TerminalKey\s*=\s*(.*)$/)
        {

            # this means we have the "terminal key"
            $termkeyval = $1;
            next;    #last;
        }

        if ($in_section and $fline =~ /^$ExecKey\s*=\s*(.*)$/)
        {

            # this means we have the "exec key"
            $execkeyval = $1;
            if ($execkeyval =~ m/^.*xterm -e.*;bash.*$/i)
            {
                $execkeyval = 1;    # this script likely set this value before
            }
            next;                   #last;
        }
    }

    if ($execkeyval eq 1)
    {
        # force this to true, because this can be updated by this script,
        #   b/c we appear to have modified this entry before.
        $termkeyval = 1;
    }
    return $termkeyval;
}

<a name="IsBTProgram-"></a>sub IsBTProgram
{
    my @lines    = @{$_[0]};
    my $key      = "Categories";
    my $isbtprog = 0;              #default = FALSE = 0
    my $i        = 0;
    foreach my $fline (@lines) {
        next if $fline =~ /^#/;       # skip comments
        next if $fline =~ /^\s*$/;    # skip empty lines

        if ($fline =~ /^\[$section\]$/) {
            $in_section = 1;
            next;
        }

        if ($fline =~ /^\[/) {
            $in_section = 0;
            next;
        }
        if ($in_section and $fline =~ /^$key\s*=\s*(.*)$/)
        {

            # this means we have the "terminal key"
            if ($1 =~ m/.*BT-.*/i)
            {
                $isbtprog = 1;
            }
            last;
        }
    }
    return $isbtprog;
}

I saved that file to my home folder at /home/mick

Next we need to run the script, but first we will backup all menu files in case something goes wrong. Open up a terminal:

cd ~/
mkdir menu_backup
sudo cp /usr/local/share/applications/* ~/menu_backup

Now we have made a backup of the menus, so it is safe to run our Perl script now:

sudo perl ./UpdateBTMenu.pl

That’s it! Your BackTrack tools (with menu structure) are ready to use within Ubuntu!

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