Wireless Network Testing And Security Threats
In the last few decades wireless networks have become an integral part of our life. These networks are required to be tested through the process of wireless network testing in order to ensure that the network is working properly and to check whether there are any security breaches in the network or not. Since the times when wireless technique emerged, there has been a continuous threat to security to these networks. Wireless network testing can be used to identify areas that are vulnerable to attack. In order to ensure network security, various security measures are imposed. The type of security measure employed depends upon the type of security threat faced. There are a lot of different types of security attacks. Normally there are three types of security attacks:
* Man in the middle attacks. * ARP poisoning attacks. * Denial of service attacks. WEP key-cracking, which is often also considered an attack, will be discussed in detail along with manipulation and eavesdropping. In an eavesdropping attack the person who attacks gives attention to transmissions of different hosts even if the computer of the attacker is not a part of transmission. In this type of attack, a lot of sensitive data is leaked. A lot of valuable information is leaked out to third party sources and the user is not even aware of it. In manipulation attacks, data stream is received in an unauthorized way and all its contents are changed so that they do not suit the attacker. Modifications are also done in MAC address or the IP address in order to ensure network security. Some other types of modifications are also done. In order to prevent eavesdropping attacks, all the contents must be encrypted with the help of IPSec, SSL or SSH. If this is not done, your valuable information may be leaked out and attackers may pick that data to cause intentional or unintentional damage to you. ARP stands for Address Resolution Protocol. It allows Ethernet connections to use TCP/IP as their protocol and to know which entity on the network has which IP address. This protocol broadcasts the traffic to hosts even if the packet was destined for a particular host. The message is received by the host and computer stores the MAC address of responding computer in the cache so that no more investigation is required for transmission. In the denial of service attack, users are not allowed to access resources. In these types of attacks those users who are not able to provide relevant authentication details are not allowed to access the network. Damage from all such types of attacks can be avoided if wireless network testing is carried out. |