Here's a quick comparison of Hydra and Medusa. This is based on my
understanding of Hydra 5.0 and Medusa 1.4. It should be noted that
even if a particular item is checked, it does not necessarily
mean it works correctly. I have not used Hydra in a number of years.
If newer versions have addressed some of the known issues or added
new functionality that should be reflected here, please let me know.
| Area | Feature | Hydra | Medusa | |
| * | License | HYDRA | GPL-2 | |
| Bugs | &radic | &radic | ||
| Core | Parallel Method | fork() | pthread | |
| Service Design | Built-in | Modular | ||
| Speed | ? | ? | ||
| Generic Wrapper Module | &radic | |||
| CVS | Broken - infinite loop | &radic | ||
| FTP | FTP | &radic | &radic | |
| Explicit FTPS (AUTH TLS Mode as defined in RFC 4217) | &radic | |||
| Implicit FTPS (FTP over SSL (990/tcp) | &radic | |||
| HTTP | Basic Auth | Broken - Base64 incorrect for some passwords | &radic | |
| NTLM Auth (Windows Integrated) | &radic | |||
| HTTP Proxy | &radic | |||
| ICQ | &radic | |||
| IMAP | Method AUTH-LOGIN Support | &radic | &radic | |
| Method AUTH-PLAIN Support | &radic | |||
| LDAP | &radic | |||
| Microsoft SQL | &radic | &radic | ||
| MySQL | Pre-4.1 Authentication | &radic | &radic | |
| Pre-4.1 Hash Passing | &radic | |||
| 4.1 Authentication | &radic | |||
| NCP (NetWare) | &radic (ncpfs) | |||
| NNTP | &radic (Original AUTHINFO) | &radic (Original AUTHINFO) | ||
| Oracle | Database | Non-Functional | &radic (via Wrapper script) | |
| Listener | Non-Functional | |||
| PcAnywhere | Supported Encryption Level | None | None | |
| Supported Authenication Mode(s) | Native PCA | Native PCA, ADS, NT, Windows | ||
| PCNFS | &radic | |||
| POP3 | &radic | &radic | ||
| PostgreSQL | &radic | &radic | ||
| REXEC | &radic | &radic | ||
| RLOGIN | .rhost Support | &radic | ||
| Password Support | &radic | &radic | ||
| RSH | &radic | &radic | ||
| SAPR3 | &radic | |||
| SIP | &radic | |||
| SMB (Microsoft Windows/Samba) | NetBIOS Mode | &radic | &radic | |
| W2K Native Mode | Broken | &radic | ||
| Hash Passing | Broken | &radic | ||
| SMTP | AUTH | &radic | &radic | |
| AUTH with TLS | &radic | |||
| VRFY | &radic | |||
| SNMP | &radic (overwrites sysName with "HYDRA") | &radic (significantly faster design) | ||
| SOCKS5 | &radic | |||
| SSHv2 | &radic (libssh) | &radic (libssh2) | ||
| SVN | &radic | &radic | ||
| TeamSpeak | &radic | |||
| Telnet | Generic Telnet | &radic | &radic | |
| Cisco (AAA/non-AAA) | &radic | &radic | ||
| Cisco enable password | &radic | |||
| VNC | Password-less/Password-only Support | &radic | &radic | |
| Anti-Brute Force Slowdown Support | &radic | |||
| Username/Password Support | ||||
| VmWare Authentication Daemon | Non-SSL Authentication | &radic | &radic | |
| SSL Authentication | &radic | |||
| Web Form Module | &radic |