Kali Linux & FreshTomato

Parrot OS was on my old ThinkPad for many years. I recently upgraded it and had some issue with my multi-bootloader. Although it’s not Parrot OS’s fault, I switched to Kali Linux as a workaround.

I’ve been using this pentesting system since early BackTrack era but never felt it ought to be installed on a hard drive.

The graphic installer is much simpler than Parrot OS that may not be an issue for most people. My complain is just because my multi-boot hard drive has a very complex partition structure where an advanced installer is needed.

The driver support of Kali Linux is also inferior to Parrot OS. I have to prepare or install the wlan driver manually although it’s a common problem with Broadcom chips.

Unfortunately, This auto installing script did not work and sudo apt-get install firmware-b43-installer worked partially.

The wlan adapter wouldn’t connect to a router with 802.11 N only mode. It only connects with Auto or B/G mixed mode. This is acceptable since I just need to tweak settings in the router system freshtomato. Basic - Network - Wireless eth - Wireless Network Mode - Auto In this case I don’t care much about network performance.

Anonsurf

To be honest, I only use this system occasionally. So as long as it’s not rolling release, I’m OK with it.

It’s glad to have those pre-installed VPN clients but I still miss Anonsurf from Parrot OS. VPN provides good security against MITM attacks but in case of privacy and tracking, VPNs can’t compete with TOR at all. When needed, it’s better to have both VPN and TOR at the same time to maximize security and privacy.

In my case, I just need TOR running system-wide (a.k.a. Torification) like Whonix or Tails. The built-in Anonsurf is the main reason I had been using Parrot OS. Thanks to Und3rf10w maintaining kali-anonsurf so I can still have Anonsurf around even without Parrot OS.

Installation is easy by following this guide but it’s not as handy as in Parrot OS where I can run anonsurf with one-click.

So I made a simple script for that reason.

First, create anonsurf.sh by nano or text editor with contents below:

#!/bin/sh
sudo anonsurf start
sudo anonsurf myip
sudo anonsurf status

Save it and chmod +x anonsurf.sh in case of permission issue.

Then, create a shortcut on taskbar:

Panel - Add New Items - Launcher - Properties - Add a new empty item

Name: anonsurf
Command: /path/to/anonsurf.sh
Icon: network-disconnect
check Run in terminal

Done. Now by clicking the shortcut, it will start anonsurf and show connection info within terminal. Close the window and run it again will change to another node automatically.

It’s good to set the script auto start with the system but I’d prefer to run it manually with one-click shortcut button.