IP spoofing allows a user to disguise or change their computer’s IP address, often used for illegal or unethical practices. An IP address is a computer’s location on the internet, assigned by the ISP. Spoofing can be used for internet-based attacks or unauthorized access to a system by mimicking a trusted computer’s IP address.
An Internet Protocol (IP) address is a computer’s address on the Internet. IP spoofing allows a computer user to disguise their IP or make it appear different than it really is. IP spoofing is typically used to do one of two things; hide the identity of the counterfeit computer or make the counterfeit computer appear to be something other than what it is. While there are legitimate reasons to spoof your system, in most cases, IP spoofing is used to cover up illegal or unethical practices.
To understand what IP spoofing is and how it works, you need to know a little about Internet Protocol addresses. In the same way that a home address indicates the exact location of a home, an IP address indicates the location of a computer. Every computer has an IP, which is usually assigned to it by the Internet Service Provider (ISP). This IP address allows information intended for your computer to find you among millions of other machines connected to the system.
Information packets sent over the Internet contain the sender’s address and their destination address. From the IP address, you can identify the issuing ISP. Most ISPs assign IP addresses in blocks based on location. Every person within a given geographic area has similar IP addresses. Thus, it is easy to trace the basic location of any IP address connected to a system.
If a person performs IP spoofing, the sender’s address in the packets is either missing or tampered with. When the connected system tries to find out where the information is coming from, it gets the wrong information or none at all. This result is similar to blocking caller identification (ID) on a phone.
IP spoofing is typically used for two purposes: launching internet-based attacks and gaining unauthorized access to a computer system. The most common type of attack is a Denial of Service (DoS) attack. In a DoS attack, the attacking computer sends as much information as possible to a target server in an attempt to overload it. Sent packets of information contain random, often incomprehensible data, and the sending address is randomly generated or completely removed.
When unauthorized access is gained to a system, the spoofer changes its address to that of a trusted computer. If two computers are designed to trust each other, such as computers from different government departments, they don’t require passwords or security to exchange information. By making the spoofer’s computer look like the first department’s computer by mimicking its IP address, information about the other is easier to access.
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