Understanding Attacks on Public Hotspots

A.

In the scenario described, the attacker has configured an access point to broadcast the same Service Set Identifier (SSID) as a public hotspot. The attacker then launches a deauthentication attack against clients that are connected to the legitimate hotspot, with the aim of forcing these clients to disassociate from the legitimate AP and potentially associate with the attacker's rogue access point.

The deauthentication attack is a type of wireless attack where an attacker sends forged disassociation or deauthentication frames to legitimate clients or access points, causing them to drop their current wireless connection. This attack takes advantage of the fact that Wi-Fi networks use unencrypted management frames, which can be easily intercepted and spoofed.

Therefore, in addition to the deauthentication attack, the attacker is also attempting to carry out a man-in-the-middle attack. A man-in-the-middle (MITM) attack occurs when an attacker intercepts and modifies communications between two parties who believe they are communicating directly with each other. In this scenario, the attacker is attempting to position themselves between the legitimate access point and the client, allowing them to intercept and modify network traffic between the two.

MAC spoofing involves forging the MAC address of a network device in order to impersonate another device on the network. While MAC spoofing could be used in this scenario to impersonate the legitimate access point, it is not necessary for the attack to be successful.

Layer 1 DoS refers to a denial-of-service attack at the physical layer of the network, such as jamming or interference. While this type of attack could be used to disrupt wireless communications, it is not applicable to the scenario described.

Finally, a disassociation attack is a specific type of deauthentication attack that targets individual clients rather than access points. In this scenario, the attacker is targeting the legitimate access point in order to force clients to disassociate, rather than targeting individual clients directly.

In summary, the attacker in this scenario is carrying out a deauthentication attack with the intention of launching a man-in-the-middle attack to intercept and modify network traffic between legitimate clients and the rogue access point. Therefore, the correct answer is A, man-in-the-middle.