What is a Middleman Attack and How Do You Prevent It?
In a middleman attack, a hacker works secretly to intercept communication between two parties who are trying to speak directly.
By doing this, the hacker can see what the user shares, read it and change it occasionally. It is common for real parties to be unaware when someone is spying on them. Someone might carry out these attacks whenever you shop online, handle your finances, or send messages privately.
The United States experiences many problems related to middleman attacks. According to a 2023 report from IBM, MITM attacks account for about 35% of all data breaches involving stolen personal information. Because more people work online at home and in public places, the chance of attacks has increased.
How Middleman Attacks Work
Imagine that you go to your bank’s website over free Wi-Fi offered at a cafe. You might assume you are using your bank’s site, but there could be a fake one there, set up by a hacker. Every time you log in, your username and password arrive on the hacker’s computer. If the hacker hides your stolen information, you might still get to the legitimate site, never realising what just happened. It’s common for hackers to send fake messages that are supposedly from major companies. Clicking on a link from these notices may direct you to a phoney website.
How to Prevent a Middleman Attack
An excellent way to keep yourself safe is by joining secure networks. Avoid conducting important transactions online, such as banking or shopping, if you’re using public Wi-Fi unless you set up a Virtual Private Network (VPN). A VPN makes your data secure by making it unreadable to hackers.
Always review how protected the site is before beginning. Watch for a “https://” in the URL of any website you visit. Because the “s” is in the URL, your connection to the website is encrypted and safe to use since your information is encrypted. According to the Federal Trade Commission, up to 60 per cent of Americans still occasionally ignore obvious signs about risky websites and therefore risk their personal information.
It’s very important to ensure your devices receive the latest updates. Updates to your software often clear out glitches that would leave you open to middleman attacks. If passwords are assigned to each account and you receive a code on your phone at login, this helps to keep your information protected.
Using an external company for ethical hacking may alert you to the presence of middlemen and let you develop ways to address that issue.
As usual, keep your eyes open for anything unusual. If you see something odd in the look, speed, or spelling of a website, it may be an untrustworthy site set up by hackers.
