Which term describes an attack where packets and authentication tokens are captured using a sniffer?

Which term describes an attack where packets and authentication tokens are captured using a sniffer?

• A. Access Gateway Layer
• B. Edge Technology Layer
• C. Jamming Attack
• D. Replay Attack

Answer: (D)

Capturing traffic with a sniffer and then reusing those credentials to gain access is a replay attack. The attacker takes valid packets or authentication tokens from a previous session and presents them again to the system, impersonating the legitimate user. This happens when the protocol doesn’t enforce freshness for each authentication—there’s nothing to prevent the old data from being replayed as if it were a new login. To stop replay attacks, systems use fresh challenges (nonces), timestamps, or one-time or short-lived tokens, and often require mutually authenticated channels so that old captured data becomes useless. The other terms don’t describe this behavior: a jamming attack disrupts communication with interference, while access gateway layer and edge technology layer are architectural concepts, not attack methods.

Capturing traffic with a sniffer and then reusing those credentials to gain access is a replay attack. The attacker takes valid packets or authentication tokens from a previous session and presents them again to the system, impersonating the legitimate user. This happens when the protocol doesn’t enforce freshness for each authentication—there’s nothing to prevent the old data from being replayed as if it were a new login. To stop replay attacks, systems use fresh challenges (nonces), timestamps, or one-time or short-lived tokens, and often require mutually authenticated channels so that old captured data becomes useless. The other terms don’t describe this behavior: a jamming attack disrupts communication with interference, while access gateway layer and edge technology layer are architectural concepts, not attack methods.