Hardening Linux

Securing an operating system is critical to a company or organization’s IT infrastructure. Learning how to secure Linux is extremely important because of the wide use of the operating system on company and organization’s sever infrastructure.  Linux is used on a large percentage of servers, and it is widely used in cloud environments. Learning the best practices for securing the configurations and settings on Linux can be critical to protecting an organization’s assets.

Overview

In this lab, you will take a Linux system that has security-related issues and patch it. Security-related issues can include items such as default usernames and passwords, clear text protocols like FTP and Telnet, and poorly configured web services. When Linux systems are not secured properly, they can be compromised which could lead to data leakage as well as costly remediation. The Linux operating system has a strong reputation for taking security seriously, but it still needs to be updated and maintained on a regular basis to keep it from being compromised.

OUTCOMES

In this lab, you will learn to: 

  1. Exploit a Linux machine 
  2. Harden a Linux machine 
Courses

Key terms and descriptions

Kali Linux
An Advanced Penetration Testing Linux distribution designed for digital forensics and penetration testing, ethical hacking, and network security assessments.
Anonymous FTP
Allows a user to connect to an FTP site without an account and upload or download files.
Apache
Web server software that predominantly runs on Linux (although it can run on Windows).
nmap
A port scanner which will indicate whether ports are open or closed on a remote system.
UID of 0
Any user that has a UID of zero has root level privileges.