What is ARP spoofing?

ARP spoofing is an attack in which an attacker can send falsified ARP messages over a local area network and link the victim’s IP address with the MAC address of the attacker’s device. As a result, all the traffic that is meant for the victim will reach the attacker first. The attacker can afterward steal sensitive information or prepare for more attacks.

How is ARP spoofing perpetrated?

In ARP Spoofing, an attacker typically follows the steps mentioned below :

1. The attacker queries and finds out the IP addresses and corresponding MAC addresses of users connected to a target subnet. There are lots of ARP Spoofing tools that are commonly used for ARP Spoofing.
2. The attacker finds the victim’s IP address, then links the MAC address of the attacker’s device with the victim’s IP address, and sends out falsified ARP messages across the LAN.
3. The other hosts in the LAN cache the falsified ARP messages. As a result, traffic meant for the victim reaches the attacker instead.

What are the implications of ARP spoofing?

There can be many serious implications.

• If the attacker links multiple IP addresses to the victim’s MAC address, packets meant for several IP addresses will reach the victim alone, which can lead to a Denial of Service attack.
• The attacker can steal the victim’s session ID and access private data.
• The attacker can intercept and modify the traffic meant for the victim, which can lead to a Man-In-The-Middle attack.

How to prevent ARP spoofing?

We can take the following steps to prevent ARP spoofing attacks.

• Use packet filters and do not allow packets with conflicting source information. For example, do not allow packets that come from outside the network but contain a source IP that belongs to the network.
• Organizations can avoid trust relationships. Do not allow any machine of any IP address to access the internal data of the organization without authentication.
• There are a number of software available for the detection of ARP spoofing. You can use those.
• You can use cryptographic network protocols like HTTPS, SSH, TLS, etc. Secure communications prevent ARP Spoofing by encrypting data prior to transmission and authenticating it when it arrives.

You will get more information on how to detect an ARP spoofing attack on a computer in this article: How to detect an ARP spoofing attack on your computer?

Security Fundamentals Practice Tests

The Security Fundamentals Practice Tests test one’s fundamental knowledge of cyber security. The practice tests are good for those who are preparing for various certification exams like the CCNA, CCNP, or CompTIA. They are also good for students and IT/security professionals who want to improve their understanding of cybersecurity.