Security Tools

arp-validator – Security Tool To Detect ARP Poisoning Attacks

December 3, 2017
3 Min Read

Security Tool to detect arp poisoning attacks.

Features

  • Uses a faster approach in detection of arp poisoning attacks compared to passive approaches
  • Detects not only presence of ARP Poisoning but also valid IP-MAC mapping (when LAN hosts are using non-customized network stack)
  • Stores validated host for speed improvements
  • Works as a daemon process without interfering with normal traffic
  • Log’s to any external file

Architecture

  +-------------+                +---------------+                  +------------+    
  |  ARP packet |    ARP Reply   | Mac-ARP Header|    Consistent    |   Spoof    |
  |   Sniffer   |  ------------> |  consistency  |  --------------> |  Detector  |
  |             |     Packets    |    Checker    |    ARP Packets   |            |
  +-------------+                +---------------+                  +------------+
                                        |                                 /
                                   Inconsistent                         /
                                   ARP Packets                     Spoofed
                                        |                        ARP Packets
                                        V                         /
                                +--------------+                /
                                |              |              /
                                |   Notifier   |  <----------
                                |              |
                                +--------------+
  1. ARP Packets Sniffer
    It sniffs all the ARP packets and discards

    • ARP Request Packets
    • ARP Reply packets sent by the machine itself which is using the tool (assuming host running the tool isn’t ARP poisoning )
  2. Mac-ARP Header Consistency Checker
    It matches

    • source MAC addresses in MAC header with ARP header
    • destination MAC addresses in MAC header with ARP header

    If any of above doesn’t match, then it will notified.

  3. Spoof Detector
    It works on the basic property of TCP/IP stack.

    The network interface card of a host will accept packets sent to its MAC address, Broadcast  address
and subscribed multicast addresses. It will pass on these packets to the IP layer. The IP layer will
only  accept  IP packets  addressed to its IP address(s) and will  silently  discard the rest of the
packets.
If  the  accepted  packet  is a TCP packet it is passed on to the TCP  layer. If a TCP SYN packet is
received then the host will either respond back with a TCP SYN/ACK packet if the destination port is
open or with a TCP RST packet if the port is closed.

    So there can be two type of packets:

    • RIGHT MAC – RIGHT IP
    • RIGHT MAC – WRONG IP (Spoofed packet)

    For each consistent ARP packet, we will construct a TCP SYN packet with destination MAC and IP address as advertised by the ARP packet with some random TCP destination port and source MAC and IP address is that of the host running the tool.
    If a RST(port is closed) or ACK(port is listening) within TIME LIMIT is received for the SYN then host(who sent the ARP packet) is legitimate.
    Else No response is received within TIME LIMIT so host is not legitimate and it will be notified.

  4. Notifier
    It provides desktop notifications in case of ARP spoofing detection.

Installation
npm

[sudo] npm install arp-validator -g

source

git clone https://github.com/rnehra01/arp-validator.git
cd arp-validator
npm install
Use the binary in bin/ to run

Usage

[sudo] arp-validator [action] [options]

actions:

 start  start arp-validator as a daemon

  options:
   --interface, -i
    Network interface on which tool works
    arp-validator start -i eth0 or --interface=eth0

   --hostdb, -d
    stores valid hosts in external file (absolute path)
    arp-validator start -d host_file or --hostdb=host_file

   --log, -l
    generte logs in external files(absolute path)
    arp-validator start -l log_file or --log=log_file


 stop  stop arp-validator daemon


 status  get status of arp-validator daemon


global options:

 --help, -h
  Displays help information about this script
  'arp-validator -h' or 'arp-validator --help'

 --version
  Displays version info
  arp-validator --version

Dependencies

References
Vivek Ramachandran and Sukumar Nandi, “Detecting ARP Spoofing: An Active Technique”

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