A defense against spoofing vandals is provided, where the defense enlists the
network-addressable
device whose identity is used by the vandal. A network-addressable device checks
incoming messages for communication protocol violations that indicate that a spoofer
is using the identity of the network-addressable device. When such a protocol violation
is detected, the network-addressable device records attributes of the incoming
message in a spoofing logbook database. Further, the network-addressable device
increments a counter associated with the identity of the spoofer's target. The
value of the counter is compared with a predetermined threshold, in order to determine
if the supposed spoofing is an isolated incident or part of a persistent attack.
When the value of the counter exceeds the threshold, the network-addressable device
constructs a spoofing alert, and sends the spoofing alert to a network administrator.
The network-addressable device then rejects the message associated with the protocol violation.