Hello all, long time reader but never posted before.

I'm in the process of trying to prove a colleague that WEP is about the worst business risk in history, but I ran into a problem trying to crack a WEP key using a BackTrack VM.

Is it possible to access the wlan device from within the VM?  From what I can tell, the VM tools act kind of like an adapter and only contain an interface to a physical ethernet device.  Mapping the wireless device to a VM adapter shows up only as standard ethernet (ie. no monitor mode...).

I've tried this on VirtualPC, VMware and VirtualBox.

Thanks!
yatz

I definitely had a wifi USB dongle working in VmWare at one point.   I was still using VmWare Server 1.x then.   I don't believe that you will have much luck with built-in adapters in VmWare though.

I'm not sure what virtualization packages you're having problems with, but USB pass-through works very well in VMware Workstation 7.

Here's the new revision of that adapter that some of us have been purchasing (I haven't really had a chance to play with it yet): http://www.amazon.com/High-Gain-Long-Rang-Alfa-9dBi-Mount/dp/B0038Q4AIG/ref=wl_it_dp_o?ie=UTF8&coliid=I3LTWBRPXRYBBQ&colid=BQRJ4R1QKAS2

If you're just looking for network connectivity, the physical hardware won't matter for a VM. However, if you're trying to work specifically with wireless (i.e. injection), you're going to need to have the adapter appear as a wireless connection in the VM.

Yeah, that's what I think my problem is.  Right now I'm just trying to crack a WEP key, which will require having the adapter show up as a wireless device in the VM, as you say.  If I can get this working, then I won't need another computer and can set up a mini lab on my primary box.

I have tested other network-based exploits like MS08-067 and a few browser-based ones, but the wireless attacks are more challenging (if not impossible) if you can't switch to monitor mode.



This looks promising, but I don't know why a specific wireless device should matter since the VM layer sits in between.  I suppose as a USB device the association can be directed strictly to the VM which can't be done with integrated or PCMCIA cards... Does this sound right?  If so, then any USB wireless card should work, so long as you have the right driver and the hypervisor supports USB passthrough.



I may want a dedicated box anyway for the reason you say, hayabusa.  I was trying to avoid scrounging one up though since the ones we have lying around are lying around for a reason...

This might be a good time to ask what exactly you mean by "injection."  Is this referring to a MITM scenario or something more basic?

I am working on trying to get my usb wireless card to show up in vmware.  Actually I have tried other usb devices and have not been successful with any devices and as far as I know the settings are right to detect usb. Any help would be greatly appreciated as this is keeping me from learning different pen-testing things I need to know.  I am running the latest vmware server (http://www.vmware.com/products/server/).  Ideas???

I am using BT4

Oh and one other thing, the USB device can only associate to one device at a time, so it cannot be active in the host if you want it to be used in the guest.  It may be a minor point, but something to keep in mind.