Have you ever connected to public WiFi and logged into your account without thinking\u00a0twice?<\/p>\n
What if someone was silently watching\u200a\u2014\u200aor even controlling that connection?<\/p>\n
This is exactly what happens in an On-Path\u00a0Attack.<\/strong><\/p>\n An On-path attacker places themselves between two communicating systems usually a web browser and a web\u00a0server.<\/p>\n Once in the middle, an attacker can\u00a0:<\/p>\n Intercept sensitive dataModify communicationImpersonate either\u00a0side<\/p>\n This type of attack is also know as Man-in-the-Middle(MITM) attack<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Think of it like a rogue postal\u00a0worker:<\/p>\n Opens your\u00a0lettersReads your private\u00a0messagesEdits the\u00a0contentSends them\u00a0forward<\/p>\n You never reliaze your communication was compromised.<\/p>\n You request a\u00a0websiteThe attacker intercepts your\u00a0requestThey forward it to a real\u00a0serverThe response comes back through the\u00a0attackerThey can read or modify everything<\/p>\n You believe that you\u2019re talking directly to the website\u200a\u2014\u200abut you\u2019re\u00a0not.<\/p>\n Unencrypted HTTP traffic is easy to intercept. Attackers can steal username & passwords and inject malicious scripts.<\/p>\n Websites store login sessions in cookies. If cookies are stolen, then attackers can gain access without requiring passwords, and attacker can impersonate the\u00a0user.<\/p>\n DNS Spoofing tricks your system into connecting to a fake\u00a0server.<\/p>\n In this attack, attacker interferes and gives you a fake ip address instead. google.com –> real server<\/p>\n You get redirected to:<\/p>\n google.com –> fake server<\/p>\n How to Prevent DNS Spoofing?<\/strong><\/p>\n Use HTTPS\u00a0websitesAvoid using public wifi or\u00a0vpnClear DNS cache regularlyUse secure DNS(like google DNS\/Cloudflare DNS)<\/p>\n Attackers intercept email communications. In this, attackers put themselves in between an email server and the\u00a0web.<\/p>\n Once the server is compromised, the attackers can monitor email communications for various purposes.<\/p>\n Once such scam involves waiting for a scenario where one person needs to transfer money to another\u00a0person.<\/p>\n The attacker can then use a spoofed email address to request the money to be transferred to an attacker\u2019s account. This email will seem legitimate to the recipient(\u201cSorry, there\u2019s typo in my last mail, my actual account number is\u00a0: XXXX-1233\u201d) making this attack very effective and financial devastating.<\/p>\n Public WiFi is one of the easiest attack\u00a0points.<\/p>\n Attackers can create fake WiFI networks, monitor traffic and redirect users to the fake websites.<\/p>\n That \u201cfree wifi\u201d could cost you your\u00a0data.<\/p>\n Invisible to\u00a0users.Full access to\u00a0dataData leaksMalware infections<\/p>\n Now the main point is, How you can protect yourself? Use HTTPS(SSL\/TLS)Avoid using public WiFi or\u00a0VPNEnable Multi-Factor Authentication(MFA)Keep Systems\u00a0updatedVerify Emails Carefully<\/p>\n For more such content related to devOps and security, you can also checkout my\u00a0GitHub<\/em><\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n On-Path Attacks Explained: How Hackers Secretly Intercept Your Internet Traffic<\/a> was originally published in Coinmonks<\/a> on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Have you ever connected to public WiFi and logged into your account without thinking\u00a0twice? What if someone was silently watching\u200a\u2014\u200aor even controlling that connection? This is exactly what happens in an On-Path\u00a0Attack. What is an On-Path Attacker? An On-path attacker places themselves between two communicating systems usually a web browser and a web\u00a0server. Once in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":144553,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-144552","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interesting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144552"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=144552"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144552\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/144553"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=144552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=144552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=144552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}What is an On-Path Attacker?<\/h3>\n
How On-Path Attacks\u00a0Works?<\/h3>\n
Common Types of On-Path\u00a0Attacks<\/h3>\n
HTTP Interception<\/h4>\n
Session Hijacking<\/h4>\n
DNS Spoofing(DNS Cache Poisoning)<\/h4>\n
So instead of going to real\u00a0website:<\/p>\nEmail Hijacking<\/h4>\n
Public WiFi\u00a0Attacks<\/h4>\n
Why On-Path attacks are dangerous?<\/h4>\n
<\/strong>There is no single solution, but these practices help significantly:<\/p>\n