New sister project: FingerBank, open DHCP fingerprints database

August 22, 2011

We just launched a new project at Defcon around DHCP fingerprinting called Fingerbank where we want to share tools, findings, fingerprints and discuss DHCP fingerprinting in the open.

http://www.fingerbank.org/

A DHCP fingerprint is an almost unique identifier for a specific operating system or device type. Due to the broadcast and pervasive nature of DHCP, DHCP fingerprinting is a very low-cost low-effort way to do passive system identification and inventory.

Because of PacketFence’s Unknown DHCP Fingerprint reporting abilities we’ve received a ton of DHCP fingerprint submissions. Some we could figure out and some that we still don’t know what type of device or software is doing the requests.

We are looking for people who have access to all sort of hardware that could submit new fingerprints and validate some fingerprints we are unsure about.

We created two mailing list for the project, one more discussion, tools, improvements oriented and one solely focused on signature / fingerprint updates.

If you are interested, sign up for any of the list. These should be very low volume mailing lists and shouldn’t take any of your time.

Thanks again for your interest in our projects!