Terms of use Everyone has heard of the legally dubious packet sniffers. Downloading and using these tools is done entirely at your own risk per our Terms of use . Unlike telephone circuits, computer networks are shared communication channels.
Sharing means that computers can receive information that was intended for other machines.
To capture the information going over the network is called sniffing. Sniffer programs display the contents of all packets passing through a particular network, regardless of whether they are intended for that computer. Although sniffer programs have legitimate uses as diagnostic tools, they can be employed for malicious activity as well. Packet sniffing is a form of wire-tap applied to computer networks instead of phone networks. This means that traffic on a segment passes by all hosts attached to that segment.