CAPEC-272: Protocol Manipulation
An adversary subverts a communications protocol to perform an attack. This type of attack can allow an adversary to impersonate others, discover sensitive information, control the outcome of a session, or perform other attacks. This type of attack targets invalid assumptions that may be inherent in implementers of the protocol, incorrect implementations of the protocol, or vulnerabilities in the protocol itself.
Last updated
Overview
CAPEC-272 (Protocol Manipulation) is a meta-level attack pattern catalogued by MITRE in the Common Attack Pattern Enumeration and Classification (CAPEC). It describes a recurring method attackers use to exploit software weaknesses.
What the attacker needs
Prerequisites
- The protocol or implementations thereof must contain bugs that an adversary can exploit.
Resources required
- In some variants of this attack the adversary must be able to intercept communications using the protocol. This means they need to be able to receive the communications from one participant and prevent the other participant from receiving these communications.
Frequently asked questions
Common questions about CAPEC-272.
- What is CAPEC-272?
- An adversary subverts a communications protocol to perform an attack. This type of attack can allow an adversary to impersonate others, discover sensitive information, control the outcome of a session, or perform other attacks. This type of attack targets invalid assumptions that may be inherent in implementers of the protocol, incorrect implementations of the protocol, or vulnerabilities in the protocol itself.
- How severe is CAPEC-272?
- MITRE rates CAPEC-272 as Medium severity.
References
Attack-pattern data is sourced from the MITRE CAPEC catalog (v3.9). Weakness associations link to the corresponding CWE entries on RadicalNotion.AI.
Defend against CAPEC-272
Track the CVEs and weaknesses attackers exploit with this technique, with AI-written analysis and remediation guidance.