mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng
An open-source entry in TopGit's GitHub warehouse: mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng, 2.2k stars, Python. FakeNet-NG - Next Generation Dynamic Network Analysis Tool
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D O C U M E N T A T I O N
FakeNet-NG 3.5 is a next generation dynamic network analysis tool for malware analysts and penetration testers. It is open source and designed for the latest versions of Windows (and Linux, for certain modes of operation). FakeNet-NG is based on the excellent Fakenet tool developed by Andrew Honig and Michael Sikorski.
The tool allows you to intercept and redirect all or specific network traffic while simulating legitimate network services. Using FakeNet-NG, malware analysts can quickly identify malware's functionality and capture network signatures. Penetration testers and bug hunters will find FakeNet-NG's configurable interception engine and modular framework highly useful when testing application's specific functionality and prototyping PoCs.
Installation
You can install FakeNet-NG in a few different ways. Note that the following installation processes will retrieve third-party open-source libraries used by FakeNet-NG to your system. These libraries will be dynamically loaded at runtime, and some of these libraries may be LGPL licensed.
Stand-alone executable
It is easiest to simply download the compiled version which can be obtained from the releases page:
https://github.com/mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng/releases
Execute FakeNet-NG by running 'fakenet.exe'.
This is the preferred method for using FakeNet-NG on Windows as it does not require you to install any additional modules, which is ideal for a malware analysis machine.
NOTE: FakeNet-NG may be flagged as malicious by Antivirus (AV) and Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) solutions (e.g., Windows Defender, Chrome's Safe Browsing). This is likely due to its ability to modify network traffic and simulate network services, in addition to the use of PyInstaller to build the release executables. The official release binaries are safe, and these detections should be considered false positives. As a reminder, FakeNet-NG is designed and highly recommended for use in a controlled and isolated environment, such as a Virtual Machine (VM), where it can safely alter the system’s network settings.
Installing module
-
Install Python 3.10.11 and latest pip for Windows/Linux OS.
-
On Windows, download and install Visual C++ build tools.
Installation on Linux requires the following dependencies:
- Python pip package manager (e.g. python-pip for Ubuntu).
- Python development files (e.g. python-dev for Ubuntu).
- OpenSSL development files (e.g. libssl-dev for Ubuntu).
- libffi development files (e.g. libffi-dev for Ubuntu).
- libnetfilterqueue development files (e.g. libnetfilter-queue-dev for Ubuntu).
Install these dependencies using the following command:
sudo apt-get install build-essential python3.10-dev libnetfilter-queue-dev -
Install FakeNet-NG as a Python module using pip:
python -m pip install https://github.com/mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng/zipball/masterOr by obtaining the latest source code and installing it manually:
git clone https://github.com/mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng/ -
Install Python dependencies by running the following commands with admin privileges:
In Linux (tested in Ubuntu 24.04.2 LTS), run the following commands before running setup.py:
python -m pip install --upgrade setuptools # build wheel for python 3.10 python -m pip install --force-reinstall netifaces # Observed "ModuleNotFoundError: No module named '_cffi_backend'" error while testing # This will get the required version of cffi packages for cryptography python -m pip install --upgrade cryptographyIf installing manually, change directory to the downloaded flare-fakenet-ng and run the following with admin privileges:
python setup.py install -
In Linux, free port 53 for DNS listener:
sudo systemctl stop systemd-resolvedExecute FakeNet-NG by running 'fakenet' from any directory in a privileged shell.
No installation
Finally if you would like to avoid installing FakeNet-NG and just want to run it as-is (e.g. for development), then you would need to obtain the source code and install dependencies as follows:
-
Install 64-bit or 32-bit Python 3.10.11 for the 64-bit or 32-bit versions of Windows/Linux respectively.
-
In Windows, install Python dependencies by running the following commands with admin privileges:
python -m pip install pydivert dnslib dpkt pyopenssl pyftpdlib netifaces jinja2NOTE: pydivert will also download and install WinDivert library and driver in the
%PYTHONHOME%\DLLsdirectory. FakeNet-NG bundles those files so they are not necessary for normal use.In Linux, install Python dependencies by running the following commands with admin privileges:
python -m pip install --upgrade setuptools # build wheel for python 3.10 python -m pip install --force-reinstall netifaces # Observed "ModuleNotFoundError: No module named '_cffi_backend'" error while testing # This will get the required version of cffi packages for cryptography python -m pip install --upgrade cryptography python -m pip install netfilterqueue dnslib dpkt pyopenssl pyftpdlib netifaces jinja2Optionally, you can install the following module used for testing:
python -m pip install requests -
Download the FakeNet-NG source code:
git clone https://github.com/mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng -
In Linux, free port 53 for DNS listener:
sudo systemctl stop systemd-resolvedExecute FakeNet-NG by running it with a Python interpreter in a privileged shell:
python -m fakenet.fakenet
Usage
The easiest way to run FakeNet-NG is to simply execute the provided
executable as an Administrator. You can provide --help command-line
parameter to get simple help:
C:\tools\fakenet-ng>fakenet.exe --help
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Version 3.5
_____________________________________________________________
Developed by FLARE Team
Copyright (C) 2016-2026 Mandiant, Inc. All rights reserved.
_____________________________________________________________
Usage: python -m fakenet.fakenet [options]:
Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
-c FILE, --config-file=FILE
configuration filename
-v, --verbose print more verbose messages (default: False)
-l LOG_FILE, --log-file=LOG_FILE
-s, --log-syslog Log to syslog via /dev/log (default: False)
-f STOP_FLAG, --stop-flag=STOP_FLAG
terminate if stop flag file is created
-p, --no-pause disable pause for confirmation before closing the console
(default: pause)
-n, --no-console-output
Suppress console output (for testing on Linux)
As you can see from the simple help above it is possible to configure the
configuration file used to start FakeNet-NG. By default, the tool uses
configs\default.ini; however, it can be changed with the -c parameter.
There are several example configuration files in the configs directory.
Due to the large number of different settings, FakeNet-NG relies on the
configuration files to control its functionality.
NOTE: FakeNet-NG will attempt to locate the specified configuration file, first
by using the provided absolute or relative path in case you want to store all of
your configurations. If the specified configuration file is not found,
then it will try to look in its configs directory.
The rest of the command-line options allow you to control the amount of logging output displayed as well as redirecting it to a file as opposed to dumping it on the screen.
Simple run
Before we dive in and run FakeNet-NG let's go over a few basic concepts. The tool consists of several modules working together. One such important module is the Diverter which is responsible for redirecting traffic to a collection of listeners. The Diverter forces applications to interact with FakeNet-NG as opposed to real servers. Listeners are individual services handling incoming connections and allowing us to examine application's traffic (e.g. malware signatures).
Let's launch FakeNet-NG using default settings by running the following command:
C:\tools\fakenet-ng>fakenet.exe
Below is the annotated output log illustrating a sample intercepted DNS request and an HTTP connection:
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Version 3.5
_____________________________________________________________
Developed by FLARE Team
Copyright (C) 2016-2026 Mandiant, Inc. All rights reserved.
_____________________________________________________________
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ FakeNet] Loaded configuration file: configs/default.ini
/
default configuration file /
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ Diverter] Capturing traffic to packets_20160706_222052.pcap
/
PCAP output file /
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ FakeNet] Anonymous Forwarder listener on TCP port 8080...
\
\ Anonymous Listener rule
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ RawTCPListener] Starting...
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ RawUDPListener] Starting...
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ FilteredListener] Starting...
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ DNS Server] Starting...
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ HTTPListener80] Starting...
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ HTTPListener443] Starting...
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ SMTPListener] Starting...
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ Diverter] Starting...
\
\ Listeners starting up
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ Diverter] Diverting ports:
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ Diverter] TCP: 1337, 80, 443, 25
07/06/16 10:20:52 PM [ Diverter] UDP: 1337, 53
/
Summary of diverted ports /
07/06/16 10:21:03 PM [ Diverter] Modifying outbound external UDP request packet:
07/06/16 10:21:03 PM [ Diverter] from: 192.168.250.140:49383 -> 4.2.2.1:53
07/06/16 10:21:03 PM [ Diverter] to: 192.168.250.140:49383 -> 192.168.250.140:53
07/06/16 10:21:03 PM [ Diverter] pid: 456 name: malware.exe
/
Intercepted traffic to the DNS server from malware.exe /
07/06/16 10:21:03 PM [ DNS Server] Received A request for domain 'evil.com'.
\
\ Fake DNS Listener handling the above request
07/06/16 10:21:04 PM [ Diverter] Modifying outbound external TCP request packet:
07/06/16 10:21:04 PM [ Diverter] from: 192.168.250.140:2179 -> 192.0.2.123:80
07/06/16 10:21:04 PM [ Diverter] to: 192.168.250.140:2179 -> 192.168.250.140:80
07/06/16 10:21:04 PM [ Diverter] pid: 456 name: malware.exe
/
Intercepted traffic to the web server from malware.exe /
07/06/16 10:21:08 PM [ HTTPListener80] Received a GET request.
07/06/16 10:21:08 PM [ HTTPListener80] --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
07/06/16 10:21:08 PM [ HTTPListener80] GET / HTTP/1.0
07/06/16 10:21:08 PM [ HTTPListener80]
07/06/16 10:21:08 PM [ HTTPListener80] --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
\
\ Fake HTTP Listener handling the above request
Notice that each log line has a name of the currently running FakeNet-NG
modules. For example, when it is diverting traffic, the logs will be prefixed
with the Diverter label:
07/06/16 10:21:03 PM [ Diverter] Modifying outbound external UDP request packet:
07/06/16 10:21:03 PM [ Diverter] from: 192.168.250.140:49383 -> 4.2.2.1:53
07/06/16 10:21:03 PM [ Diverter] to: 192.168.250.140:49383 -> 192.168.250.140:53
07/06/16 10:21:03 PM [ Diverter] pid: 456 name: malware.exe
At the same time, whenever individual listeners are handling diverted traffic, logs will be labeled with the name set in the configuration file:
07/06/16 10:21:03 PM [ DNS Server] Received A request for domain 'evil.com'.
To stop FakeNet-NG and save the generated PCAP file and HTML report to disk simply press CTRL-C:
07/06/16 10:21:41 PM [ FakeNet] Stopping...
07/06/16 10:21:42 PM [ HTTPListener80] Stopping...
07/06/16 10:21:42 PM [ HTTPListener443] Stopping...
07/06/16 10:21:42 PM [ SMTPListener] Stopping...
07/06/16 10:21:43 PM [ Diverter] Stopping...
07/06/16 10:21:43 PM [ Diverter] Generated new HTML report: report_20160607_102143.html
[Press Enter to exit]
Wait for the PCAP and report to be generated, then press Enter to quit. The console
window will stay open until you do; this can be disabled (for example, in scripts)
with the --no-pause flag.
User Interface
With each session of FakeNet-NG, an HTML report containing the Network-Based Indicators (NBIs) captured throughout the session is generated. Upon termination of FakeNet by pressing CTRL-C, this HTML file will be saved to the root directory of FakeNet. A user can review the NBIs by viewing this HTML file in a browser such as Chrome or Firefox.
The HTML report serves as an interactive Graphical User Interface (GUI) that presents the NBI summary in a user-friendly manner. It includes various features to select, filter, and copy NBIs, making network analysis easier. The UI organizes all NBIs based on their process information and then further categorizes them by the application layer or transport layer protocol they use.
NBI Summary Table
The information in the NBI summary table is presented in a tabular format and includes the following details:
-
Select: Clicking on the checkbox selects the corresponding NBI. You can select multiple NBIs across different or the same protocols. The entire row can also be selected by clicking anywhere within the row. Selected NBIs can be copied using the "Copy Selected NBIs" button.
-
NBI: This cell represents the actual captured NBI. It includes commands, parameters, URIs, and other significant activity generated by the client against the listener. This cell summarizes malware behavior for better understanding.
-
Additional Information: This cell provides extra information about each NBI request such as the transport layer protocol used, destination IP, port, and SSL encryption.
-
Actions: This cell allows you to perform actions on individual NBIs. Currently, only copying is supported. Clicking the copy button copies the specific NBI cell data in a markdown format suitable for creating reports.
Interactive Features
The UI also includes various interactive features:
-
Checkbox Selection: Checkboxes are available before each process and protocol block. Ticking a checkbox selects all NBIs under that process or protocol. This is useful when you want to select all NBIs from a particular process or protocol. You can then use the
Copy Selected NBIsbutton to copy the selected data. -
Search Bar: The search bar lets you type keywords, and only the rows containing these keywords in the process name, NBI, or additional information will be displayed in the HTML page. You can then use the "Copy Filtered Data" button to copy the displayed data in markdown format. Clearing the search query restores the original table view.
-
Copy Buttons:
Copy Selected Data: Copies all the selected NBIs in markdown format. You can select individual NBIs or all NBIs under a process by ticking checkboxes.Copy Filtered Data: Copies the filtered NBIs' data in markdown format. If no search query is used, this button copies the entire data.Copy All NBIs: Copies all the NBIs in markdown format present in the HTML page. Even if a filter is applied, clicking this button copies all NBIs.
-
Disclaimer Button: Displays the disclaimer, which outlines important facts for the user to consider before making assumptions about the displayed NBI summary.
-
Go To Top Button: Appears when the page's content exceeds the viewable area. Clicking this button takes you to the top of the page, where you can access important buttons like
Copy Selected NBIs,Copy All NBIs,Copy Filtered NBIs, and the search bar.
Configuration
In order to take full advantage of FakeNet-NG's capabilities we must understand its configuration file structure and settings. Below is a sample configuration file:
###############################################################################
# Fakenet Configuration
[FakeNet]
DivertTraffic: Yes
###############################################################################
# Diverter Configuration
[Diverter]
NetworkMode: Auto
LinuxRedirectNonlocal: *
LinuxFlushIptables: Yes
LinuxFlushDNSCommand: service dns-clean restart
DumpPackets: Yes
DumpPacketsFilePrefix: packets
ModifyLocalDNS: No
StopDNSService: Yes
RedirectAllTraffic: Yes
DefaultTCPListener: RawTCPListener
DefaultUDPListener: RawUDPListener
###############################################################################
# Listener Configuration
[DNS Server]
Enabled: True
Port: 53
Protocol: UDP
Listener: DNSListener
DNSResponse: 192.0.2.123
NXDomains: 0
Hidden: False
[RawTCPListener]
Enabled: True
Port: 1337
Protocol: TCP
Listener: RawListener
UseSSL: No
Timeout: 10
Hidden: False
The configuration file is broken up into several sections.
-
[FakeNet] - Controls the behavior of the application itself. The only valid option at this point is
DivertTraffic. When enabled, it instructs the tool to launch the appropriate Diverter plugin and intercept traffic. If this option is disabled, FakeNet-NG will still launch listeners, but will rely on another method to direct traffic to them (e.g. manually change DNS server). -
[Diverter] - Settings for redirecting traffic. Covered in detail below.
-
[Listener Name] - A collection of listener configurations. Each listener has a set of default settings (e.g. port, protocol) as well as listener specific configurations (e.g. DumpHTTPPosts for the HTTPListener).
Diverter Configuration
Supposing you have enabled the DivertTraffic setting in the [FakeNet]
configuration block, the tool will enable its traffic redirection engine to
which we will call Diverter from now on as a reference to the excellent
WinDivert library used to perform the magic behind the scenes on Windows
platforms (the Linux implementation of the Diverter uses
python-netfilterqueue).
The Diverter will examine all of the outgoing packets and match them against a list of protocols and ports of enabled listeners. If there is a listener listening on the packet's port and protocol, then the destination address will be changed to the local machine's IP address where the listener will handle the request. At the same time, responses coming from the listener will be changed so that the source IP address would appear as if the packet is coming from the originally requested host.
You can optionally enable the DumpPackets setting to store all traffic
observed by FakeNet-NG (redirected or forwarded) to a PCAP file. It is possible
to decrypt SSL traffic between an intercepted application and one of the
listeners with SSL support. Use the instructions at the following page:
https://wiki.wireshark.org/TLS
The keys privkey.pem and server.pem used by FakeNet-NG's servers are in the
application's root directory.
- NetworkMode - Specify the network mode in which to run FakeNet-NG.
- Valid settings are:
SingleHost: manipulate traffic from local processes.MultiHost: manipulate traffic from other systems.Auto: use whateverNetworkModeis most functional on the current platform.
- Not all platforms currently support all
NetworkModesettings. Here is the current status of support:- Windows supports only
SingleHost - Linux supports
MultiHostand experimentally supportsSingleHostmode (works with the exception of process, port, and host blacklisting and whitelisting).
- Windows supports only
- For now, leave this set to
Autoto getSingleHostmode on Windows andMultiHostmode on Linux.
- Valid settings are:
The Diverter generally supports the following DNS-related setting:
- ModifyLocalDNS - point local machine's DNS service to FakeNet-NG's DNS listener.
The Windows implementation of Diverter supports the following DNS-related setting:
- StopDNSService - stops the Windows DNS client service (Dnscache). This allows FakeNet-NG to see the actual processes resolving domains as opposed to the generic 'svchost.exe' process.
The Linux implementation of Diverter supports the following settings:
-
LinuxRedirectNonlocal - When using FakeNet-NG to simulate Internet connectivity for a different host, this specifies which externally facing network interfaces to re-route to FakeNet-NG.
-
LinuxFlushIptables - Flush all
iptablesrules before adding rules for FakeNet-NG. The Linux Diverter will restore the old rules as long as its termination sequence is not interrupted. -
LinuxFlushDnsCommand - Specify the correct command for your Linux distribution to flush the DNS resolver cache if applicable.
-
DebugLevel - Specify fine-grained debug events to display. Refer to fakenet/diverters/linutil.py for valid labels.
Redirecting All Traffic
By default the Diverter will only intercept traffic that has a dedicated
listener created for it. However, by enabling RedirectAllTraffic setting
and configuring the default TCP and UDP handlers with the DefaultTCPListener
and DefaultUDPListener settings it is possible to dynamically handle traffic
going to ports not explicitly defined in one of the listeners. For example,
let's look at a sample configuration which redirects all traffic to
local TCP and UDP listeners on ports 1234:
RedirectAllTraffic: Yes
DefaultTCPListener: TCPListener1234
DefaultUDPListener: UDPListener1234
NOTE: We are jumping a bit ahead with listener definitions, but just
consider that TCPListener1234 and UDPListener1234 will be defined in
the section below.
With the RedirectAllTraffic setting, FakeNet-NG will modify not only the
destination address, but also the destination port so it can be handled
by one of the default listeners. Below is a sample log of traffic destined to
an external host IP address 1.1.1.1 on port 4444 which was redirected to the
default listener on port 1234 instead:
07/06/16 01:13:47 AM [ Diverter] Modifying outbound external TCP request packet:
07/06/16 01:13:47 AM [ Diverter] from: 192.168.66.129:1650 -> 1.1.1.1:4444
07/06/16 01:13:47 AM [ Diverter] to: 192.168.66.129:1650 -> 192.168.66.129:1234
07/06/16 01:13:47 AM [ Diverter] pid: 3716 name: malware.exe
It is important to note that traffic destined to the port from one of the explicitly defined listeners will still be handled by that listener and not the default listener. For example, default UDP listener will not handle DNS traffic if a separate UDP port 53 DNS listener is defined.
One issue when enabling the RedirectAllTraffic options is that you may
still want to let some traffic through to ensure normal operation of the
machine. Consider a scenario where you are trying to analyze an application
that still needs to connect to an external DNS server. You can utilize the
BlackListPortsTCP and BlackListPortsUDP settings to define a list of
ports to which traffic will be ignored and forwarded unaltered or
BlackListIDsICMP (Windows only) to define a list of ICMP IDs to be filtered and ignored:
BlackListPortsUDP: 53
Some other Diverter settings that you may consider are ProcessBlackList
and HostBlackList which allow Diverter to ignore and forward traffic
coming from a specific process name or destined for a specific host
respectively.
Listener Configurations
Listener configurations define the behavior of individual listeners. Let's look at a sample listener configuration:
[TCPListener1234]
Enabled: True
Port: 1234
Protocol: TCP
Listener: RawListener
UseSSL: Yes
Timeout: 10
Hidden: False
The configuration above consists of the listener name TCPListener1234. It
will be used for logging purposes so you can distinguish between different
listeners handling connections even if they are handling the same protocol.
The following settings are generic for all listeners:
- Enabled - specify whether or not the listener is enabled.
- Port - TCP or UDP port to listen on.
- Protocol - TCP or UDP
- Listener - Listener name to handle traffic.
- ProcessWhiteList - Only traffic from these processes will be modified and the rest will simply be forwarded.
- ProcessBlackList - Traffic from all but these processes will be simply forwarded and the rest will be modified as needed.
- HostWhiteList - Only traffic to these hosts will be modified and the rest will be simply forwarded.
- HostBlackList - Traffic to these hosts will be simply forwarded and the rest will be modified as needed.
- ExecuteCmd - Execute command on the first connection packet. This feature is useful for extending FakeNet-NG's functionality (e.g. launch a debugger on the connecting pid to help with unpacking and decoding.)
- Hidden - Do not allow traffic to be directed to this listener without going through the proxy which will determine the protocol based on the packet contents
The Port and Protocol settings are necessary for the listeners to know to
which ports to bind and, if they support multiple protocol (e.g RawListener),
decide which protocol to use. They are also used by the Diverter to figure out
which ports and protocols to redirect.
The Listener setting defines one of the available listener plugins to handle
redirected traffic. The current version of FakeNet-NG comes with the following
listeners:
- DNSListener - supports DNS protocol and replies to A records with either
a local machine's IP address or a configurable address in
the
DNSResponsesetting. You can also set theNXDomainsattribute to the number of requests the listener should ignore. This way you may be able to get the malware to request all of its backup C2 controller names. The listener supports both TCP and UDP protocols. - RawListener - supports basic TCP and UDP binary protocols. The default behavior is to simply echo the received packets back to the client. Supports SSL connections.
- HTTPListener - supports HTTP and HTTPS protocols. Responds with different
files in the configurable
Webrootdirectory based on the requested file extension. Optionally dumps POST requests to a configurable file which can be specified usingDumpHTTPPostsandDumpHTTPPostsFilePrefixsettings. - SMTPListener - supports SMTP protocol.
- ProxyListener- Detects protocol based on packet contents and redirects packets accordingly.
NOTE: FakeNet-NG will attempt to locate the webroot directory, first by using
the provided absolute or relative paths. If the specified webroot path is not
found, then it will try to look in its defaultFiles directory.
As a special case, the Windows Diverter implementation automatically responds to all ICMP requests while running. So in case a malware attempts to ping a host to test connectivity it will get a valid response. The Linux Diverter logs and forwards all ICMP packets to localhost.
NOTE: Some listeners can handle file uploads (e.g. TFTPListener and BITSListener). All uploaded files will be stored in the current working directory with a configurable prefix (e.g. "tftp_" for TFTP uploads).
Listener Filtering
FakeNet-NG supports several filtering rules consisting of process and host blacklists and whitelists. The whitelists are treated as the rules that allow connections to the listeners while the blacklists are used to ignore the incoming connections and let them to be simply forwarded.
For example, consider the configuration below with process and host filters:
[FilteredListener]
Enabled: True
Port: 31337
Protocol: TCP
Listener: RawListener
UseSSL: No
Timeout: 10
ProcessWhiteList: malware.exe, ncat.exe
HostBlackList: 5.5.5.5
The FilteredListener above will only handle connection coming from the
processes malware.exe and ncat.exe, but will ignore any connections
destined for the host 5.5.5.5. Meaning that if a process called test.exe
attempted to connect on port 31337 it will not be redirected to the listener
and will be forwarded to wherever it was originally intended if the route
is available.
At the same time of the process malware.exe attempted to connect to port 31337
on any host other than 5.5.5.5 it will be diverted
to the FilteredListener. Any connections from the process malware.exe
destined to 5.5.5.5 would be allowed through.
Listener Command Execution
Another powerful configuration setting is ExecuteCmd. It essentially
allows you to execute an arbitrary command on the first detected packet
of the connection. The value of ExecuteCmd can use several format string
variables:
{pid}- process id{procname}- process executable name{src_addr}- source address{src_port}- source port{dst_addr}- destination address{dst_port}- destination port
Consider a scenario of a packed malware sample which connects to a configured
C2 server on port 8443 (Use RedirectAllTraffic if the port is not known). In
many cases the malware would unpack itself by the time it makes the connection
making that point in execution ideal to attach to the process with a debugger
and dump an unpacked version of it for further analysis.
Let's see how this can be used to automatically launch a debugger on the first connection:
[C2Listener]
Enabled: True
Port: 8443
Protocol: TCP
Listener: RawListener
UseSSL: Yes
Timeout: 300
ProcessWhiteList: malware.exe
ExecuteCmd: C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Debuggers\x86\windbg.exe -p {pid}
Once FakeNet-NG detects a new connection coming from the whitelisted process
malware.exe (this setting is optional), it will automatically launch windbg
and attach it to the connecting process.
NOTE: You might want to extend the normal Timeout setting in case the malware
needs to further interact with the listener.
Anonymous Listener
There is a special use case where you can create a new listener configuration without defining the actual listener to handle it:
[Forwarder]
Enabled: True
Port: 8080
Protocol: TCP
ProcessWhiteList: chrome.exe
Without a listener defined, FakeNet-NG will still divert traffic to the local machine, but a separate listener must be launched by the user. For example, you could have an HTTP proxy listening for connections on port 8080 and let FakeNet-NG intercept all the traffic from applications which do not use system's proxy server settings or use hard-coded IP addresses. Using anonymous listeners you can bring FakeNet-NG's advanced traffic and process filtering capabilities to 3rd party tools.
You may also want to enable Diverter's ProcessBlackList setting to allow
the external tool to communicate out to the Internet. For example, to allow
an HTTP proxy to forward proxied traffic add its process name to the process
blacklist. For example, add the following process to let Burp Proxy to
communicate out to the Internet:
ProcessBlackList: java.exe
In the scenario where application communicates on an unknown port, but you still want to redirect it to the anonymous listener on port 8080 you can define the default listener as follows:
RedirectAllTraffic: Yes
DefaultTCPListener: ForwarderTCP
DefaultUDPListener: RawUDPListener
Finally, to allow DNS traffic to still go to the default DNS server on the Internet, while redirecting all other traffic, add port 53 to the Diverter's UDP port blacklist as follows:
BlackListPortsUDP:
Proxy Listener
The latest release of FakeNet-NG implements a new proxy listener which is capable of dynamically detecting communicating protocol (including SSL traffic) and redirecting the connecting to an appropriate listener.
You can configure the proxy listener to work on a specific port as illustrated in the configuration below:
[ProxyTCPListener]
Enabled: True
Protocol: TCP
Listener: ProxyListener
Port: 38926
Listeners: HTTPListener, RawListener, FTPListener, DNSListener, POPListener, SMTPListener, TFTPListener, IRCListener, BITSListener
Hidden: False
Note, the new Listeners parameter which defines a list of potential protocol handlers
to try for all incoming connections.
It is also recommended to define a proxy listener as your default handler by updating the following diverter configurations:
RedirectAllTraffic: Yes
DefaultTCPListener: ProxyTCPListener
DefaultUDPListener: ProxyUDPListener
With the default listener pointing to the proxy listener, all unknown connections will be appropriately handled. You can still assign specific listeners to ports to enforce a specific protocol (e.g. always use HTTP listener for port 80).
The Proxy determines the protocol of packets by polling all available listeners with the function taste(). Each Listener that implements taste() will respond with a score indicating the likelihood that the protocol handled by that listener matches the packet contents. The Proxy will forward the packet to the Listener that returned the highest score. The RawListener will always return a score of 1, so it will be chosen in the case that all other Listeners return 0, thus serving as the default.
Users can alter the configuration parameter 'Hidden' in each Listener's configuration. If Hidden is 'False', the Listener will be bound to a specific port and automatically receive all traffic on that port. With Hidden set to 'True', the Listener can only receive traffic that is redirected through the Proxy.
Development
FakeNet-NG is developed in Python which allows you to rapidly develop new plugins and extend existing functionality. For details, see Developing for FakeNet-NG.
Known Issues
[WinError 87] The parameter is incorrect
As of this wriring, the default buffer size in pydivert is 1500. If FakeNet-NG encounters a packet larger than the default buffer size, you may observe this error. A workaround is to specify the desired buffer size in self.handle.recv(bufsize=<your_bufsize>) in fakenet/diverters/windows. See here
Does not work on VMWare with host-only mode enabled
See "Not Intercepting Traffic" below.
Not Intercepting Traffic
In order to for FakeNet-NG to intercept and modify the packet, there must exist a valid network route for the packet to reach its destination.
There is an easy way to check whether or not you have routes set up correctly. Without the tool running attempt to ping the destination host. You should observe either a valid response or a timeout message. If you receive a destination not reachable error instead, then you do not have a valid route.
This is usually caused by your gateway being either not set or not reachable. For example, on a VMWare machine with host-only mode your machine will not have the gateway configured thus preventing FakeNet-NG from seeing any traffic.
To correct this issue, manually configure your primary interface to the gateway in the same subnet. First check the interface name:
C:\>netsh interface show interface
Admin State State Type Interface Name
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Enabled Connected Dedicated Local Area Connection
In this case the interface name is "Local Area Connection" so we will use it for the rest of the commands.
Manually configure the interface IP address and gateway as follows:
C:\>netsh interface ip set address name="Local Area Connection" static 192.168.249.123 255.255.255.0 192.168.249.254
Manually set the DNS server IP address
C:\>netsh interface ip set dns name="Local Area Connection" static 4.2.2.2
If you are still having issue ensure that the gateway IP address itself is routable.
DNS Not Resolving Names
Ensure that the DNS Listener successfully bound to its port. Errors such as the following indicate that the DNS Listener did not successfully bind:
05/01/17 11:11:16 AM [ FakeNet] Error starting DNSListener listener:
05/01/17 11:11:16 AM [ FakeNet] [Errno 98] Address already in use
Use netstat, tcpview, or other tools to discover what application is bound
to the port, and refer to the corresponding operating system or application
documentation to disable the service.
It may make sense to capture a VM snapshot before undertaking reconfiguration.
For example, Ubuntu commonly enables the dnsmasq service in
/etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf with the line dns=dnsmasq.
Disabling this (such as by commenting it out) and restarting the
network-manager service (e.g. service network-manager restart) is
sufficient to free the port before re-launching FakeNet-NG.
In newer versions of Ubuntu or in other distributions, using lsof -i may
reveal that systemd-resolved is used instead. In these cases, you may try
these steps adapted from
https://askubuntu.com/questions/907246/how-to-disable-systemd-resolved-in-ubuntu:
sudo systemctl stop systemd-resolved
sudo systemctl disable systemd-resolved
Then in /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf under the [main] section, add a line specifying:
dns=default
Delete the symlink /etc/resolv.conf, i.e. rm /etc/resolv.conf.
Finally, restart NetworkManager:
sudo systemctl restart NetworkManager
Error: Could not locate WinDivert DLL or one of its components
Please ensure that FakeNet-NG is extracted to the local C: drive to make sure the WinDivert driver is loaded correctly.
Error: The application has failed to start because its side-by-side configuration is incorrect.
This error may occur when running a stand-alone executable version of Fakenet. Please download and install Visual C++ 2008 runtime executable.
Limitations
-
Only Windows Vista+ is supported for
SingleHostmode. Please use the original Fakenet for Windows XP/2003 operating systems. -
Only Linux is supported for
MultiHostmode. -
Old versions of python-netfilterqueue can cause a segmentation fault in
python. If you experience this issue, check that you are using the latest version of python-netfilterqueue. -
Due to the hard-coded buffer size used by python-netfilterqueue, the Linux Diverter does not correctly handle packets greater than 4,016 bytes in size. In practice, this does not affect Linux
MultiHostmode for interfaces configured with the conventional 1,500 byte maximum transmittal unit (MTU). If the Linux interface you are using with FakeNet-NG supports an MTU greater than 4016, you will need to recompile python-netfilterqueue to support a buffer size of<your_mtu> + 80(python-netfilterqueue devotes 80 bytes of the buffer to overhead). -
Local machine only traffic is not intercepted on Windows (e.g. if you tried to connect directly to one of the listeners).
-
Only traffic using TCP, UDP, and ICMP protocols is intercepted.
Credits
- FakeNet-NG was designed and developed by Peter Kacherginsky.
- Special thanks to Andrew Honig, Michael Sikorski and others for the original FakeNet which was the inspiration to develop this tool.
- The Linux Diverter was designed and developed by Michael Bailey.
- Thanks to Matthew Haigh for developing the proxy protocol autodetection feature.
- Thanks to Cody Pierce and Antony Saba for reporting and fixing a file system traversal vulnerability.
Contact
For bugs, crashes, or other comments please contact [email protected].
Subscribe to the FLARE mailing list for community announcements! Email "subscribe" to [email protected].
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Quick answers
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What is mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng?
mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng (mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng) is a Python project on GitHub. From the project's own README: FakeNet-NG - Next Generation Dynamic Network Analysis Tool
What language is mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng written in?
mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng is written primarily in Python. GitHub's language field is based on the largest share of bytes in the default branch.
What topics is mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng associated with?
GitHub's repository topics for mandiant/flare-fakenet-ng: "fakenet-ng", "gsoc-2026", "malware-analysis", "mandiant-flare", "traffic-redirection". TopGit's editorial category is open-source.
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