Wireless hacking is a cyber-attack that is done on wireless networks for gaining unauthorized access to a user’s private network. The main aim of the hacker is to get confidential information of the user like wifi password, bank information, etc. Wireless hacking is growing rapidly in the world and is a big threat for cyber-crime officials.
Wireless Hacking:
Wireless hacking is not a new term for cyber security cell, in fact, it has increased in the past few decades. Not only businesses, but every house need internet to connect their mobile phones and smart TV. So, it has become very easy for malicious hackers to hack wireless networks because wireless signals can be exploited and picked by anyone and from anywhere. The major attacks are made on the internal steps of the protocol stack itself.
Wireless hacking can be done using some techniques that hackers use to hack wireless networks. These techniques are explained below.
De-authentication Attacks
A wireless de-authentication attack refers to a kind of service denial attack that focuses on the communication between a point of wireless access and its user. It is a unique way of hacking a wireless network, in which an attacker sends a de-authentication frame to a point of wireless access having an address that is spoofed to the user. In this technique, the protocol doesn’t actually need any kind of encryption for the frame even if the session was established with WEP - Wired Equivalent Privacy for data protection.
WPA /WPA2 Cracking
There is a very common human behavior to save the passwords on their devices so that it doesn’t bother them whenever they use the device. The hackers take advantage of this behavior of yours and forcefully reject all the authentic devices on the network. With finishing the 4-way handshake, the device then tries to connect to the access point automatically. This handshake gets captured via recording and has a hashed password which can be archived using a rainbow table.
Wireless Hacking Tools and their Usage
Wireless hacking tools are software programs designed specifically to hack wireless networks. While some tools are designed to gain access to the network password or to the network itself. These tools help the hacker to crack wifi networks through various techniques. Apart from that, these tools also assist the organization to check wireless systems for any mysterious activity happening in their security system.
There are two types of wireless hacking tools, one is used to sniff the network and check what is happening in the network, and the second tool is used to hack WEP/WPA keys.
Unmasking Hidden SSID
Service Set Identifier (SSID) is a network name that is given to identify a wireless network. It can be detected by other wireless-enabled devices as uses wireless AP. Usually, organizations hide their SSID to protect it from hacking, so when the hacker tries to detect a hidden SSID that method is called unmasking the hidden SSID. Detecting hidden SSID is done with two methods, first when the hacker detects the SSID using the Wireshark method, and second by applying the de-authentication attack method.
Dictionary Attack
A dictionary attack is a method of wireless hacking in which the attacker breaks into a password-protected network, computer, or any IT resource in a very systematic manner by entering every word in a dictionary as a password. It can also be used as an attempt to detect the key necessary to decrypt encrypted data or messages. The attacker uses preselected characters, words or sentences to find out the potential passwords. It is an assumption-based hacking tool that users mostly get from a fundamental set of passwords.
This is a common hacking method because businesses or computer users insist on using habitual words as their passwords. These attacks fail against systems that use multiple-word passwords and against passwords made up of a random combination of uppercase and lowercase letters and numbers.
Bruteforce Attack
The term “Brute force” means excessive forceful attempts to get access to the user account. The hacker uses trial and error methods to crack passwords, encryption keys, and login credentials. This is a trusted method for gaining unauthorized access to user accounts and any organization’s systems and networks. In this tactic, the attacker uses various usernames and passwords using a computer system to check a wide range of combinations, until they get the appropriate login credentials.
However, it is an old cyberattack method, but this will remain a popular tactic with attackers as it is a tried and tested method of wireless hacking.
Hybrid Attack
A hybrid attack in wireless hacking is a type of cyberattack where the hacker uses two or more types of tools to carry out the hacking process. Generally, it is a combination of a dictionary attack and a brute-force attack. In this hacking method, the attacker uses a list of breached usernames and passwords which are obtained from previous incidents. Then the attacker uses a brute-force method by trying more combinations of letters, numbers, and symbols.