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If I do a traceroute to Wikipedia I see that the connection goes through several seemingly unrelated networks before reaching "ge-2-2.br1-knams.wikimedia.org". To simplify things for my question, lets assume it's just;
- myisp.org - somenetwork.net - wikimedia.org
I assume my http requests, ip address, and other info are sent to each link along the connection? What verification checks are in place (if any) to ensure that one of the links doesn't corrupt or alter the info either by accident or on purpose for some nefarious reason? For example, "somenetwork.net" receives my ip as 82.44.55.25 but sends my ip as 12.34.56.78 to wikimedia.org. Is such a thing possible? Would wikimedia.org see 12.34.56.78? 82.44.55.25 ( talk) 22:05, 9 January 2011 (UTC)
It is technically very possible for someone in the middle to alter the data without the endpoints noticing. The only protection against that is an authentication scheme. Https, IPSEC, and similar protocols provide some protection against this if done correctly. Note that authentication here is different than encryption, although a good encryption system will almost certainly have authentication (the opposite doesn't have to). Shadowjams ( talk) 00:30, 11 January 2011 (UTC)
Computing desk | ||
---|---|---|
< January 8 | << Dec | January | Feb >> | January 10 > |
Welcome to the Wikipedia Computing Reference Desk Archives |
---|
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages. |
If I do a traceroute to Wikipedia I see that the connection goes through several seemingly unrelated networks before reaching "ge-2-2.br1-knams.wikimedia.org". To simplify things for my question, lets assume it's just;
- myisp.org - somenetwork.net - wikimedia.org
I assume my http requests, ip address, and other info are sent to each link along the connection? What verification checks are in place (if any) to ensure that one of the links doesn't corrupt or alter the info either by accident or on purpose for some nefarious reason? For example, "somenetwork.net" receives my ip as 82.44.55.25 but sends my ip as 12.34.56.78 to wikimedia.org. Is such a thing possible? Would wikimedia.org see 12.34.56.78? 82.44.55.25 ( talk) 22:05, 9 January 2011 (UTC)
It is technically very possible for someone in the middle to alter the data without the endpoints noticing. The only protection against that is an authentication scheme. Https, IPSEC, and similar protocols provide some protection against this if done correctly. Note that authentication here is different than encryption, although a good encryption system will almost certainly have authentication (the opposite doesn't have to). Shadowjams ( talk) 00:30, 11 January 2011 (UTC)