Wireshark

Learn why network traffic analysis tools like Wireshark are invaluable for pentesters.

Introduction to Wireshark

Wireshark is a software used in network packet analysis by network engineers, system administrators, and hackers. It’s used to monitor and inspect outgoing and incoming packets for security and troubleshooting purposes. The application not only allows users to monitor the traffic in real time, but it also allows users to save the captured traffic for further or future analysis.

Perhaps Wireshark’s greatest benefit is the fact that it’s an open-source tool with a large community of developers that contribute to its improvements, thus enhancing its capabilities in the network analysis process. It also has a CLI equivalent called TShark, which can also prove useful in certain scenarios.

Let’s now get familiar with Wireshark’s GUI. Launching it on our platform will reveal the following greeting:

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