SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol)

Definition: SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol): The Internet infrastructure is composed of lots of hardware scattered around the place. SNMP is the method that allows someone to "manage" all that equipment. By the word "manage" I mean do things like monitor the amount of traffic flowing through the equipment, trigger when faults occur, change the configuration of equipment remotely, and so forth. Key point: Most equipment comes with default passwords (aka. community strings) of public and private. These allow you to read information from the device (traffic, temperature, voltage, etc.) and re-configure it. Key point: A common technique is to traceroute to a victim's dial-up machine thereby discovering the IP address of the hardware they've dialed into. Then, you can send SNMP commands with the "private" community strings telling the hardware to hang-up on the victim. Also, spammers have used this technique to find the true login name of the user. From Hacking-Lexicon

* Linux/Unix/Computing Glossary