GCIH · Question #789
What goal would an attacker achieve with the following Set of commands?
The correct answer is C. Find possible targets. The commands shown perform active network reconnaissance to enumerate live hosts and services, helping an attacker identify possible targets before launching further attacks. This is a standard discovery phase in a penetration test or attack.
Question
What goal would an attacker achieve with the following Set of commands?
Options
- APoison DNS cache
- BSpoof an IP address
- CFind possible targets
- DPromiscuously collect packets
How the community answered
(36 responses)- A11% (4)
- B3% (1)
- C81% (29)
- D6% (2)
Why each option
The commands shown perform active network reconnaissance to enumerate live hosts and services, helping an attacker identify possible targets before launching further attacks. This is a standard discovery phase in a penetration test or attack.
Poisoning a DNS cache requires sending crafted, forged DNS response packets to a resolver to overwrite legitimate records, which uses entirely different tooling and techniques than host discovery scanning.
Spoofing an IP address involves forging the source IP field in raw packets to impersonate another host, requiring raw socket or packet crafting tools rather than standard reconnaissance utilities.
Host and service discovery commands such as ping sweeps and port scans map which IP addresses are active and which ports are open, providing the attacker with a list of reachable systems and potential attack surfaces - the core goal of the reconnaissance phase.
Promiscuously collecting packets requires placing a network interface in promiscuous mode and capturing all passing frames using a sniffer such as Wireshark or tcpdump, which is a passive technique unlike the active scanning commands shown.
Concept tested: Network reconnaissance and live host target discovery
Source: https://nmap.org/book/man-host-discovery.html
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