Hands-On RESTful API Design Patterns and Best Practices

Man-in-the-middle attacks

An MITM attack is an attack by a perpetrator who has placed themself in the middle of a network or communication between a genuine user and an application server. They intend to steal, eavesdrop on, impersonate and secretly relay, intercept, or alter communications, including API messages, between two communicating parties, all while it appears as though a normal exchange of information is underway:

The preceding diagram depicts a typical MITM attack, where the eavesdropper impersonates and relays communications/responses to the caller as they come from the server, and they will appear genuine.

An example of an MITM ...