See also: Hacker | Hackerspeak
Term used to describe monitoring data traveling over a network. It is called “sniffing” as if tracking information by smell. This is also known as making a network interface card, or NIC, “promiscuous” instead of “passive” mode.
It can be used for both good and evil, from spying on users to Intrusion detection
Sniffing is a strong motivation for use of encryption, especially over Cable Modems as neighbors can monitor your activity.
- Sniffers can be used both for legitimate network management functions and for stealing information off a network. Unauthorized sniffers can be extremely dangerous to a network’s security because they are difficult to detect and can be inserted almost anywhere. This makes them a favorite weapon in the cracker‘s arsenal.
- (Developed from the Webopedia Sniffer entry – Copyright 2003 Jupitermedia Corporation All Rights Reserved.)
Related
Sniffing tools
- Snort
- TCPdump
- Ethereal free for Windows – a SourceForge project
- Sniff-em Windows based Packet sniffer.
- DSniff A collection of tools for network auditing.
Sniffing detectors
- SniffDet – a SourceForge project
- Anti Sniff toolbox
- IPV6-enabled Linux system A guide on detecing Sniffers on the Network.
Network Sniffers and Sniffing out network sniffersTakeDown.NET -> “Sniff”