Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH v11) — Question 87

Abel, a security professional, conducts penetration testing in his client organization to check for any security loopholes. He launched an attack on the DHCP servers by broadcasting forged DHCP requests and leased all the DHCP addresses available in the DHCP scope until the server could not issue any more IP addresses. This led to a DoS attack, and as a result, legitimate employees were unable to access the client's network.
Which of the following attacks did Abel perform in the above scenario?

Answer options

• A. Rogue DHCP server attack
• B. VLAN hopping
• C. STP attack
• D. DHCP starvation

Correct answer: D

Explanation

The correct answer is D, DHCP starvation, as it specifically refers to the method of exhausting available DHCP addresses through forged requests, leading to a denial of service for legitimate users. Option A, Rogue DHCP server attack, involves a malicious DHCP server, but that wasn't the primary method used here. Options B and C, VLAN hopping and STP attack, are unrelated to the DHCP issues described in the scenario.