cyber security, penetration testing, anti-forensic and evasion tools

[kaspar5]

Hello everyone, I have secured a 12 months internship with an IT security company as a software engineer. In preparation towards the placement I want to either dual-boot linux on my mac (either Ubuntu or Kali). How safe/reliable is such set-up? I'm probably going to opt-out for Ubuntu because apparently that is what the company uses for server and desktop side at their offices and I have been using this OS before.

Now, most importantly I would love you to help me find some learning resources in the area of cyber security something that will provide me with a solid foundation before I start working there.

[TheFu]

Welcome.

The forum rules don't let us take much about breaking into systems or the software used to test security, so asking about those tools here generally ends in a closed thread, as it should. We can discuss how to secure a system. See my signature for links.

Kali is highly non-secure. It isn't designed to be secure and running everything as root is a real issue. Don't use this as a desktop, please.

Ubuntu is more secure than OSX, IMHO. Ubuntu actually patches security issues provided you run a supported release while it is still under support. OSX ... tends to patch a few years late.

If you want to learn IT security - only governments use "cyber" - join those groups. DefCon, ISSA, SANS .... all have local groups. Your Defcon group in the USA/CA is normally found by searching for "dc"+areacode - mine is DC404 ... this works internationally too - London has DC4420. Fun group there. Search for irongeek to find recordings from different security conferences and other interesting stuff.

[kaspar5]

Thank you for the reply, which was actually really useful, will definitely join the discussion regarding system vulnerability/security later on.

Also regarding the dual boot, I have a late macbook air 2011, is there any known issues, or danger of data corruption if I would be to install the latest LTS release of Ubuntu? Alternatively I could run this through VB, although would probably loose a lot in CPU efficiency etc.

All the best.