GlossaryAdvanced
Man-in-the-Middle Attack
An attack where a third party secretly intercepts and possibly alters communication between two parties.
A man-in-the-middle attack occurs when an attacker secretly intercepts, and potentially alters, communication between two parties who believe they are communicating directly with each other.
In a crypto context, this could mean intercepting a wallet address shared over an insecure channel and substituting the attacker's own address instead.
Examples
- Using an unsecured public network can increase risk of a man-in-the-middle attack.
- Independently verifying a recipient address through a second, trusted channel helps defend against this.