Man-In-The-Middle

Running head : MAN-IN-THE-MIDDLE ATTACK

Man-In-The-Middle Attack

Name

University

Course

Tutor

Date

Man-In-The-Middle Attack

The Man-In-The-Middle attack or MITM attacks as popularly known , is a phrase that is used to describe a computer system attack whereby the intruder positions himself between two communicating ends and then intercepts and alters all the messages exchanged between the two terminals (Bhansali , 2001 . This may involve funneling communication between a specific website and their consumer through the creation of a fake website and then redirecting the unsuspecting consumer to the

website . Thus , the intruder or criminal acts as the middleman in all transactions between a specific client or consumer and the organization and in the process acquires valuable information that may be financial or otherwise such as credit-card numbers and access passwords . This paper describes how MITM attacks take place and how one can defend their systems against it

It is important to note that this type of attack requires real-time intervention by the criminal and thus attacks that involve review of past records or the stealing of logs cannot be classified as MITM attacks . There are two main ways in which this kind of attack takes place . The first way involves a case where the attacker is using the same domain for broadcast such as the same subnet with their target and the second way involves a case where the attacker has control of a router located somewhere along the network path between his target and the server that the target is in communication...