So in case you don't know about SmashTheStack, it is a wargaming site for testing your hacking skills. The site can be located HEREE

So for the first Blowfish level, we need to telnet to:
blowfish.smashthestack.org 6666

Once we telnet to that specific box, we should get some instructions and a hashed password. To move on to the next level on the Blowfish series, we need to crack this hash and SSH to level2@blowfish.smashthestack.org port 22(SSH)
So to crack this we will be using a tool called John The Ripper(JTR for short). To install JTR, first update your aptitude like so:

This will update your repo's and get the latest package cache.(Requires internet connection). So now that we have it updated we install john with this code:

This should install JTR. If you get a package not found error, try searching for it using


So now that we have JTR installed we are ready to crack the hash. To crack it, I'm going to make a new file on my desktop with the hash in it. So in the .txt file we are going to have a format like this:

Since we don't have a username for level2, we can put any username we want, separated with a colon then the password hash. Now we must change to the desktop. Since I am on Debian, I use this command:

This will change the directory to your desktop(Replace "chronic" with your username). Now we are ready for the password to be cracked. If you want to read the manual for JTR, type

This will load the manual for JTR. Now we need to crack the level 1 hash within the text file, which I named "pass.txt". So try this command:

This should start trying to crack the password. It should crack it in a matter of seconds.
NOTEFor quicker cracking with JTR, you may use a wordlist. A wordlist contains tons of words in a file and JTR compares them to the hash. If they compare the same, the password is cracked. If not, JTR continues to check through the whole dictionary file.

Now we should have the password hash cracked. I will not post it here so you actually have to do it :P Just open up the terminal and type

It will then give the RSA fingerprint, which you accept by typing "yes" then input the password and you should be logged onto that box :)

Stay tuned for level 2 tutorial, which I will work on soon.