Unable to connect to wlan0 (Kali)
I am running Kali Linux, and I was unable to connect to Wi-Fi. I was searching on the Internet for half an hour. I tried a lot of things. Finally, I had installed Wi-Fi driver compat-wireless.
I know that it is deprecated. Although I tried cause, backport wasn’t working properly. When I had unloaded compat-wireless. I got wlan0 and wlan1 . But, no wireless connection is showing.
Last time when I tried that by restarting my laptop. I notice that those connection isn’t visible anymore. Why it is happening? I earlier said that backport isn’t working. When I unloaded backport. I get the error:
I am adding screenshots of what I said/tried.
I added most of them as source code which is needed.
When I don’t use laptop for few hours, wlan0 works fine again. But, using laptop 1-2 hours suddenly I face the issue again.
Look it is working fine: 
after leaving turn off laptop for 10-20 minutes. After updating the question I have lost my connection again.
Output of lspci :
Output of lspci :
I took two screenshot what was happening when I had wireless connection.
When I don’t have wlan0.
Output of lspci :
I have Windows alongside Kali Linux. When I work in Windows while I don’t Kali Linux wlan0 works well in Windows.
@telcoM I did as you said. But, my wlan0 is set to DOWN . I am unable to change the state also by doing as you said. Earlier, I was unable to changed the state also. 🙁
Finally, I have understood why I am having the issue. But, I don’t know how to fix. When laptop gets hotter and hotter I lost my wireless connection. Between 23 minutes I lost my wireless connection. 
It’s been 3 hours laptop is keep running today it’s hotter enough also. But, Wireless connection is work well. I didn’t make any changes.
Note: I don’t have much more skill with Linux. I am very beginner level Linux user.
Is there any possible way to do it? I searched it on Internet also but, I didn't get any solution
2 Answers 2
So, one of your WiFi adapters is Intel Corporation Centrino Advanced-N 6205 (802.11a/b/g/n), handled by driver iwlwifi . The support for that WiFi chip has been included in the standard kernel since kernel version 2.6.35, so there really should be no need to use compat-wireless unless you are using an absolutely ancient version of Kali.
Visiting the driver information page on wireless.wiki.kernel.org, I found a note about the monitor mode with Intel WiFi chips:
About the monitor / sniffer mode
Our devices support monitor mode. When you have VHT APs around, you should load the iwlwifi module with
amsdu_size=3
This will put lots of pressure on the memory subsystem, but it will allow you to hear 12K long packets. You may see firmware crashes in case you didn’t set that module parameter.
And what is VHT ? Turns out it was the development name for what is now called 802.11ac. In other words, this note says, "if these a/b/g/n WiFi chips are used in monitor mode when there are 802.11ac base stations in range, you should use the amsdu_size=3 module option, or else the chip firmware may crash often."
This might just be what is happening to you: the iwconfig output of "when you don’t have wlan0" indicates the wlan0 interface is still being detected by the driver: it just doesn’t seem to be working correctly. Perhaps it’s because the WiFi chip firmware has crashed?
There is also a note about WiFi chip power management that used to cause issues until it was disabled in kernel version 3.17. By installing compat-wireless-2010-06-26-p you’ve effectively downgraded the WiFi drivers of a modern Kali distribution to more than 10 years old versions, and most likely restored this old problem.
So, you should create a text file in /etc/modprobe.d/ directory, with a .conf suffix, e.g. /etc/modprobe.d/wifi0.conf , and write the following text into it:
Then run update-initramfs -u as root (just in case the WiFi driver is loaded very early in the boot process) and reboot.
Your other WiFi adapter is still almost a complete mystery, since you have not revealed any information that would allow us to identify it. It seems to not be a PCI(e) device, since it does not appear in lspci listing. But as you ran make unload for compat-wireless-2010-06-26-p , one of the messages was:
That suggests it might be an Atheros WiFi adapter of some kind. unfortunately there are a lot of Atheros WiFi chips, and the modern kernels have several Atheros WiFi chip drivers (each for a particular line of WiFi chips Atheros has either produced or bought from other manufacturers) that might be applicable. To identify the adapter, a lsusb listing might be helpful.
Regarding the error message:
This indicates the compat-wireless thinks you might have kernel version 3.1.7 installed (but even it acknowledges it’s not the kernel version that’s currently running). 3.1.7 is a very old kernel version: even Kali 1.0.6 (released in year 2014) used kernel version 3.12.x. So this is most likely the obsolete compat-wireless displaying a false error message.
Kali Linux не видит Wi-Fi адаптер на виртуальной машине и основе
Привет! Установили себе чистую систему, но даже так Kali Linux не видит Wi-Fi адаптер? Обучение тестированию откладывается в дальний ящик, а зарождающийся талант начинающего безопасника попал на свалку? Ну ничего. Тоже приходилось сталкиваться с подобными проблемами на Кали. Вообще Wi-Fi и Linux старая больная тема, но именно на Kali она проявилась во всей красе от потребностей пользователей. Разберемся в этом!
Нашли ошибку? Есть своя история по этому вопросу? Оставьте свое мнение в комментариях к этой статье! Именно ваше слово может спасти кому-то уйму времени!
Для виртуальной машины
Актуально и для Virtual Box, и для VMWare Workstation.
Начнем с самого частого. Сам ставил себе виртуалку, а там главная проблема – виртуальная машина не видит встроенный модули Wi-Fi, хоть об стену разбейся. Многие годы бытует мнение, что и не увидит. А т.к. уровень виртуальной машины выше, чем установленной внутри нее Kali, то и сама Kali не увидит встроенного адаптера.
Решение простое – берется внешний USB адаптер, который успешно подключается к виртуалке.
Т.е. если вы хотите проводить тестирование своих Wi-Fi сетей через виртуальную машину – обязательно приобретите внешний модуль, в противном случае не тратьте свое время. А вот о совместимости адаптеров и возможных исправлениях – читайте ниже (чтобы не взять себе мертвый внешний адаптер Wi-Fi).
Из дополнения, возможно потребуется активировать сам адаптер в виртуальной среде. На примере Вари:
Для основы – драйверы и совместимость
На основной системе может возникнуть уже две проблемы – не видит USB адаптер и не видит встроенный адаптер. Основная причина здесь, по моему опыту – проблема с драйвером и совместимостью. Именно в этом случае не работает Wi-Fi на Kali Linux. Но обо всем по порядку.
Перед началом нашей операции рекомендую обновиться:
После этого предлагаю посмотреть список установленных устройств:
lsusb – для usb устройств
lspci – для встроенных модулей
В открывшемся большом списке ищем свою модель Wi-Fi модуля:
Т.е. если модуль не включается или просто не видит сети, а в списке этих устройств он есть – значит проблема точно в драйвере. Это и хорошо, и плохо. Обычно драйвер не включается в репозиторий по причине не полной совместимости. Например, отсутствия режима монитора как в случае с этим Броадкомом. Но для обыденных офисных задач нам ведь его можно использовать?
Далее появляются два пути:
- Посмотреть совместимости на ЭТОЙ СТРАНИЦЕ . Если чип вашего адаптера есть здесь, то все будет работать из коробки.
- Гуглим (лучшего совета и не придумаешь) по типу «driver linux ВАШАМОДЕЛЬ». Очень часто попадете на грамотные топики по теме или даже официальные драйверы устройства. Дать совет лучше? Ничего лучше не придумаешь. Универсального совета пока нет.
Чтобы данное руководство совсем не было водяным, отмечу, что некоторым просто помогает установка WICD:
apt-get install wicd
service network-manager stop
update-rc.d network-manager disable
update-rc.d wicd enable
service wicd start
И вот еще видеоверсия установки конкретного драйвера, хотя в начале тоже ругалось, что адаптеры Wi-Fi не найдены:
После перезапуска системы мозги приходят к единому согласию. За сим заканчиваю. Свои истории стучания в бубен под бодрые завывания расскажите в комментариях ниже – пригодится и вам, и другим. До скорых встреч на нашем портале!
How to enable WLAN0 on Kali Linux
B efore getting into wlan0 and how to enable it, let us dig a little into the difference between WLAN and Wi-Fi and look at how it works. To begin with, the abbreviation, WLAN, stands for “Wireless Local Area Network.” Local in WLAN generally means a network contained in a geographical location, building, or campus. The W stands for wireless.
These two terms (“WLAN and Wi-Fi) are interlinked and used interchangeably, thus creating misunderstandings among many users.
What is WLAN?
WLAN is a wireless LAN. In this case, a wireless LAN refers to a wireless computer network that connects two or more devices using a wireless mode of communication to generate a local area network within a restricted geographical area such as a home, campus, lab, or office. WLAN can be built on several wireless technologies. It is a type of network that uses radio technology instead of wiring interconnected, networked nodes. The essential aspects in WLAN are local and wireless since they loosely define the network geographic borders.
What is Wi-Fi, and how does it function?
Wi-Fi is an abbreviation that stands for wireless fidelity. Wi-Fi is the wireless standard 802.11, an evolving family of specifications for wireless local area networks (WLANs). Some people often ask themselves, is Wi-Fi a wireless LAN? Wi-Fi networks are absolutely WLANs. However, many get confused to say Wi-Fi is the only type of WLAN when it is not. However, it is safe to say Wi-Fi is the only WLAN that services human clients directly.
What is WLAN0?
To get this article going, we need to get the real meaning to tackle the generic WLAN construct. By and large, wlan0 refers to a wireless local area network Wi-Fi card. The name is broken down into two sections. The first is WLAN and the second is 0; WLAN is a wireless LAN, and 0 represents your card number.
In short, wlan0 is your first Wi-Fi card. The count starts from (0,1,2,3, e.t.c.). so, if you have 2 Wi-Fi cards plugged in, they will be represented by wlan0 and wlan1.
How to enable and disable WIFI on Kali Linux
After that dry run of the difference between a WLAN and Wi-Fi plus wlan0 description, it is time we now turn our focus to enabling and disabling wlan0 on Kali Linux. This article aims to show you how to enable or disable your wlan0 on your Kali PC easily. Here, we will make use of several commands to enable our wireless fidelity.
Step 1: Enabling wlan0
For those using virtual box, ensure you log in as root to enable the wlan0. If not, you will receive errors while running these commands. To log in as a root user on your PC, use the following command.
login as root
After that, type in the password, and you will be logged in.
Compact wireless Adapter
This wireless software contains the development and stable version (pulled from the kernel’s git repo). The software helps connect your computer to a wireless network. It also allows you to connect to any public wireless hotspots in places such as cafes, shops, hotels, etc. So, this means that we need this software to enable the wlan0. To have the software, we will first download it. Thereafter we will install it on our Kali Linux machine.
Package requirements
Below is a list of packages required for you to install this software:
- Basic development tools
- Kernel 2.6.24 or higher
Upon downloading the file, you will receive the .tar file in the respective folder you downloaded it to. The next step is extracting the file, and to do this, we will use the following command.
extracting the file
Note: The filename depends on the version you downloaded. Therefore, you will substitute the example above with the one corresponding to the file you downloaded.
After extracting the file, we will go ahead and open the extracted file using the cd command.
cd into the extracted file
After changing the directory into this file, we will run the “make unload command” that allows the extension of the software functionality.
make unload command
Subsequently, type in the “make load” command to load the Bluetooth and other wlan0 configurations.
make load command
After that, we should be through with installing the drivers, and our wlan0 should be working by now. To prove this, type in the following command:
the ifconfig command
Type in the following command that will put the adapter backup.
enabling wlan0
After that, type in the “ip a” command afterward. This will aid in verifying whether the connection is up or down.
ip a command
Step 2: Disabling wlan0
To disable Wi-Fi on our Kali PC, type in the following command, and the display will tell if the Wi-Fi is disabled or not.
disabling wlan0
Wi-Fi Adapter visibility
To see the name of your Wi-Fi adapter, together with the connection information (assuming you are already connected to a Wi-Fi network), open up your terminal and type in the following command.
wi fi adapter visibility
Conclusion
The article has gone through what Wlan and Wi-Fi are, plus their differences. After that, we focused on the steps required to enable Wi-Fi and stretched further to disabling the network and Wi-Fi, which you should be well aware of by now. We also looked at the file that helps connect our Kali PC to wireless network plus hotspots. Finally, the article also looked at the extraction process of the file plus the relevant commands that helped us get the wlan0 up and running.