I realize Nessus is currently up to version 4 with a GUI and will probably play with that at a future date. So I’m not sure how useful this install info will be to anybody but me.
Download
Download the following 4 packages from nessus.org, selecting Nessus 2.2.11 source code from the drop-down menu, accepting the user license.
- nessus-libraries-2.2.11.tar.gz (418 KB)
- nessus-plugins-2.2.11.tar.gz (7468 KB)
- nessus-core-2.2.11.tar.gz (664 KB)
- libnasl-2.2.11.tar.gz (359 KB)
Setup
- Copy files to desired directory (using your favorite SFTP/SCP client) e.g., /home/nessus
- Extract using ‘tar zxf [filename]‘
- Run the following commands to make sure the correct directories are in your $PATH
- echo “/usr/local/bin” >> /etc/ld.so.conf
- echo “/usr/local/sbin” >> /etc/ld.so.conf
- echo “/usr/local/lib” >> /etc/ld.so.conf
- ldconfig
- Make sure the following packages are installed
- libc6-dev
- openssl
- libssl-dev
- flex
- bison
- make
- Navigate to the nessus-libraries directory and run the following as root (waiting for each to complete)
- ./configure
- make
- make install
- Repeat commands in step5 inside the libnasl directory
- Change to the nessus-core directory and run
- ./configure –disable-dtk (this makes it so you can only run nessus from the command line, ideal for the environment setup earlier)
- make
- make install
- Change to the nessus-plugins directory and run
- ./configure
- make
- make install
- Run “/usr/local/sbin/nessus-mkcert” accepting all the default values
- Setup Nessus user account
- Run “/usr/local/sbin/nessus-adduser”
- Enter a user name
- Enter “pass” and create a password for the user
- To set no limits with the rules use: “default accept” (if you wish to restrict certain IP ranges use something like “accept 192.168.0.0/24″ [press enter] “default deny” – this will only allow the user to run nessus on the 192.168.0.0/24 subnet, only 255 addresses, making the default rule for any other address “deny”)
- Startup the Nessus server before you start any scans
- nessusd -D -a 127.0.0.1
An example of a command to get you started (and I’m still starting, so I won’t expound much more) is
- nessus -q 127.0.0.1 1241 [Nessus_Username] [Nessus_Username_pass] /home/nessus/target.list /home/nessus/results.nbe -T nbe -V -c /root/.nessusrc
- target.list contains a list of comma separated IP addresses
- results.nbe is where the results will be stored
- nbe is the format type (you can also use html and a few other types)
- .nessusrc is the scan policy you use that tells nessus what to do (I haven’t got too much into how this file works yet, but plan to investigate it further)
- run “nessus –help” if you have more questions on the structure of the command
