Ethical Hacking Essentials Practice Test

In which layer of the vulnerability stack do attackers flood the switches with numerous requests that exhaust the CAM table?

1. Layer 1

2. Layer 2

3. Layer 3

4. Layer 4

The correct answer is: Layer 2

The correct choice is Layer 2 because the flooding of switches with numerous requests that exhaust the Content Addressable Memory (CAM) table is a specific technique related to the data link layer of the OSI model. Layer 2 is responsible for the forwarding of frames based on MAC addresses, and the CAM table is utilized to keep track of those addresses for efficient data forwarding. When layers 2 switches receive frames, they populate the CAM table with the source MAC addresses and associated ports. If an attacker floods the network with a significant amount of traffic or spoofed MAC addresses, it can overwhelm the switches and fill up their CAM tables. Once the CAM table is full, the switch can no longer learn new MAC addresses, leading to a condition known as a "CAM table overflow." In this scenario, the switch cannot properly forward frames and may start broadcasting all incoming frames to all ports, which can lead to network congestion and further vulnerabilities. Layer 1 pertains to physical network elements, such as cables and switches, and does not deal with MAC address management. Layer 3 involves IP addresses and routing, while Layer 4 is associated with transport protocols like TCP and UDP. Therefore, the flooding of switches in this manner is distinctly a Layer 2 concern due