Unfortunately, aircrack-ng can’t pause and then resume cracking itself, but it is possible to save and then continue session with John The Ripper. In this small note you’ll find how to save the current state of aircrack-ng and then continue the cracking from where it was stopped. Cool Tip: Crack Wi-Fi access points with WPA/WPA2-PSK easily. Aircrack-ng: Fixed encryption display in some cases when prompting for network to crack Aircrack-ng: Fixed exiting Aircrack-ng in some cases Aircrack-ng: Fixed logical and physical processor count detection Aircrack-ng: Fixed PMKID length check Aircrack-ng: Various fixes and improvements to WPA cracking engine and its performance.
If you want to know how to hack WiFi access point – just read this step by step aircrack-ng tutorial, run the verified commands and hack WiFi password easily.
With the help a these commands you will be able to hack WiFi AP (access points) that use WPA/WPA2-PSK (pre-shared key) encryption.
The basis of this method of hacking WiFi lies in capturing of the WPA/WPA2 authentication handshake and then cracking the PSK using aircrack-ng.
How to hack WiFi – the action plan:
- Download and install the latest
aircrack-ng - Start the wireless interface in monitor mode using the
airmon-ng - Start the
airodump-ngon AP channel with filter for BSSID to collect authentication handshake - [Optional] Use the
aireplay-ngto deauthenticate the wireless client - Run the
aircrack-ngto hack the WiFi password by cracking the authentication handshake
1. Aircrack-ng: Download and Install
The Latest Version Only: If you really want to hack WiFi – do not install the old aircrack-ng from your OS repositories. Download and compile the latest version manually.
Install the required dependencies:
Download and install the latest aircrack-ng (current version):
Ensure that you have installed the latest version of aircrack-ng:
2. Airmon-ng: Monitor Mode
Now it is required to start the wireless interface in monitor mode.Monitor mode allows a computer with a wireless network interface to monitor all traffic received from the wireless network.
What is especially important for us – monitor mode allows packets to be captured without having to associate with an access point.
Find and stop all the processes that use the wireless interface and may cause troubles:
Start the wireless interface in monitor mode:
In the example above the airmon-ng has created a new wireless interface called mon0 and enabled on it monitor mode.
So the correct interface name to use in the next parts of this tutorial is the mon0.
3. Airodump-ng: Authentication Handshake
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Now, when our wireless adapter is in monitor mode, we have a capability to see all the wireless traffic that passes by in the air.
This can be done with the airodump-ng command:
All of the visible APs are listed in the upper part of the screen and the clients are listed in the lower part of the screen:
Aircrack-ng Commands
Start the airodump-ng on AP channel with the filter for BSSID to collect the authentication handshake for the access point we are interested in:
| Option | Description |
|---|---|
-c | The channel for the wireless network |
--bssid | The MAC address of the access point |
-w | The file name prefix for the file which will contain authentication handshake |
mon0 | The wireless interface |
--ignore-negative-one | Fixes the ‘fixed channel : -1’ error message |
airodump-ng captures a handshake.If you want to speed up this process – go to the step #4 and try to force wireless client reauthentication.
After some time you should see the WPA handshake: 00:11:22:33:44:55 in the top right-hand corner of the screen.
This means that the airodump-ng has successfully captured the handshake:
4. Aireplay-ng: Deauthenticate Client
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If you can’t wait till airodump-ng captures a handshake, you can send a message to the wireless client saying that it is no longer associated with the AP.
The wireless client will then hopefully reauthenticate with the AP and we’ll capture the authentication handshake.
Send deauth to broadcast:
Send directed deauth (attack is more effective when it is targeted):
| Option | Description |
|---|---|
--deauth 100 | The number of de-authenticate frames you want to send (0 for unlimited) |
-a | The MAC address of the access point |
-c | The MAC address of the client |
mon0 | The wireless interface |
--ignore-negative-one | Fixes the ‘fixed channel : -1’ error message |
Aircrack-ng.org
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5. Aircrack-ng: Hack WiFi Password
Unfortunately there is no way except brute force to break WPA/WPA2-PSK encryption.
To hack WiFi password, you need a password dictionary.
And remember that this type of attack is only as good as your password dictionary.
You can download some dictionaries from here.
Crack the WPA/WPA2-PSK with the following command:
Aircrack-ng -w
| Option | Description |
|---|---|
-w | The name of the dictionary file |
-b | The MAC address of the access point |
WPAcrack.cap | The name of the file that contains the authentication handshake |
Aircrack-ng
Cool Tip: Password cracking often takes time. Combine aircrack-ng with “John The Ripper” to pause/resume cracking whenever you want without loosing the progress! Read more →