COMMON ATTACK PATTERN ENUMERATION AND CLASSIFICATIONLive MITRE record

CAPEC-621

Analysis of Packet Timing and Sizes

An attacker may intercept and log encrypted transmissions for the purpose of analyzing metadata such as packet timing and sizes. Although the actual data may be encrypted, this metadata may reveal valuable information to an attacker. Note that this attack is applicable to VOIP data as well as application data, especially for interactive apps that require precise timing and low-latency (e.g. thin-clients).

Abstraction

Detailed

Typical severity

Low

Likelihood of attack

Medium

Understand the attack

What is this attack pattern?

An attacker may intercept and log encrypted transmissions for the purpose of analyzing metadata such as packet timing and sizes. Although the actual data may be encrypted, this metadata may reveal valuable information to an attacker. Note that this attack is applicable to VOIP data as well as application data, especially for interactive apps that require precise timing and low-latency (e.g. thin-clients).

Requirements

What does the attack require?

Prerequisites

  • Use of untrusted communication paths enables an attacker to intercept and log communications, including metadata such as packet timing and sizes.

Skills required

  • High: These attacks generally require sophisticated machine learning techniques and require traffic capture as a prerequisite.

Resources required

Not stated in the MITRE record.

Impact

What does a successful attack lead to?

Read Data

Affected scopes: Confidentiality

Defence

How is it prevented and mitigated?

1
Distort packet sizes and timing at VPN layer by adding padding to normalize packet sizes and timing delays to reduce information leakage via timing.
CAPEC-621: Analysis of Packet Timing and Sizes — DayBreach Saldırı Sözlüğü · DayBreach