| Name |
Man in the Middle Attack |
|
| Likelyhood of attack |
Typical severity |
| High |
Very High |
|
| Summary |
This type of attack targets the communication between two components (typically client and server). The attacker places themself in the communication channel between the two components. Whenever one component attempts to communicate with the other (data flow, authentication challenges, etc.), the data first goes to the attacker, who has the opportunity to observe or alter it, and it is then passed on to the other component as if it was never observed. This interposition is transparent leaving the two compromised components unaware of the potential corruption or leakage of their communications. The potential for Man-in-the-Middle attacks yields an implicit lack of trust in communication or identify between two components. MITM attacks differ from sniffing attacks since they often modify the communications prior to delivering it to the intended recipient. These attacks also differ from interception attacks since they may forward the sender's original unmodified data, after copying it, instead of keeping it for themselves. |
| Prerequisites |
There are two components communicating with each other. An attacker is able to identify the nature and mechanism of communication between the two target components. An attacker can eavesdrop on the communication between the target components. Strong mutual authentication is not used between the two target components yielding opportunity for attacker interposition. The communication occurs in clear (not encrypted) or with insufficient and spoofable encryption. |
| Execution Flow |
| Step |
Phase |
Description |
Techniques |
| 1 |
Experiment |
The attacker probes to determine the nature and mechanism of communication between two components looking for opportunities to exploit. |
|
| 2 |
Experiment |
The attacker inserts themself into the communication channel initially acting as a routing proxy between the two targeted components. The attacker may or may not have to use cryptography. |
|
| 3 |
Exploit |
The attacker observes, filters or alters passed data of its choosing to gain access to sensitive information or to manipulate the actions of the two target components for their own purposes. |
|
|
| Solutions | Get your Public Key signed by a Certificate Authority Encrypt your communication using cryptography (SSL,...) Use Strong mutual authentication to always fully authenticate both ends of any communications channel. Exchange public keys using a secure channel |
| Related Weaknesses |
|
CWE ID
|
Description
|
| CWE-287 |
Improper Authentication |
| CWE-290 |
Authentication Bypass by Spoofing |
| CWE-294 |
Authentication Bypass by Capture-replay |
| CWE-300 |
Channel Accessible by Non-Endpoint |
| CWE-593 |
Authentication Bypass: OpenSSL CTX Object Modified after SSL Objects are Created |
| CWE-724 |
OWASP Top Ten 2004 Category A3 - Broken Authentication and Session Management |
|
| Taxonomy: ATTACK |
|
Entry ID
|
Entry Name
|
| 1185 |
Man in the Browser |
|
| Taxonomy: OWASP Attacks |
|
Entry ID
|
Entry Name
|
| Link |
Man-in-the-browser attack |
|