OSWP – From Zero to Hero

It’s my second attempt with OffSec. Overall I enjoyed the course.

Hardware:

Alfa AWUSO36ACS
Netgear AC1000

I’m using Kali Linux on VirtualBox running on Mac OS. I think it’s fine to buy the recommended hardware by OffSec, probably save you lots of trouble. The actual examination does not require any hardware though. I bought them for practice. You probably can pass without the hardware if you manage to follow through the course notes.

Setup

My first day of studying the course materials got me wonder how I can learn to setup the hardware. But there weren’t instructions anywhere and it went straight to issuing commands. And therefore, I wrote a post – Wireless Card Setup for OSWP There is no setup needed for the router, just turn it on and make sure you can discover it in the network will do. There will be exercises to interact with the router during the course.

Troubleshooting

The materials are manageable to follow with ease. However, may faced some errors here and there.

Creating new Virtual Interface in monitor mode failed:

sudo iw dev wlan0 interface add xxx type monitor
command failed: Operation not supported (-95)

Alternatively I use the following commands to enable monitor mode

sudo ip link set wlan0 down
sudo iwconfig wlan0 mode monitor
sudo ip link set wlan0 up

It was not mentioned but you have to start wireshark using sudo. Else it will not be able to capture any packets

sudo wireshark

Not sure why sometimes I tried changing the channels in wireshark wireless toolbar but failed. So I did a check kill and restart NetworkManager. Then start wlan0 again. After that it works. Gotta make sure that wlan0 is in monitor mode.

About the Exam

It was easier than I thought. You should be able to clinch it if you have went through the entire course.

You will need Chapter 16 Manual Network Connection

Iced Milo Code