PCAP-over-IP
PCAP-over-IP is a method for transmitting captured network traffic through a TCP connection.[1] The captured network traffic is transferred over TCP as a PCAP file in order to preserve relevant metadata about the packets, such as timestamps.
Background and etymology
[edit]The first known use of the term PCAP-over-IP is by Packet Forensics in 2011.[2] However, the concept behind PCAP-over-IP was mentioned already in 2008 as part of a feature request for Wireshark.[3] The need for this feature was motivated as follows:
"This feature is useful when the capture is generated on a machine that does not have much storage (e.g. embedded system). E.g., ipmb_traced application available on Pigeon Point shelf managers can transmit the capture over the TCP connection without writing it to the filesystem."
Use cases
[edit]Common use cases for PCAP-over-IP include:
- Transmitting captured network traffic in real time to one or more remote machines
- Transferring network traffic to other applications on the same host
- Providing decrypted traffic from a TLS interception proxy to a packet analyzer or IDS.
Software with PCAP-over-IP support
[edit]Workarounds
[edit]Software that can sniff network traffic, but doesn't support PCAP-over-IP, can read packets from a PCAP-over-IP provider with the help of a netcat and tcpreplay combo.
nc [SERVER] 57012 | tcpreplay -i eth0 -t -
References
[edit]- ↑ Hjelmvik, Erik (15 August 2022). "What is PCAP over IP?". Netresec Blog. Netresec. Retrieved 25 August 2022.
- ↑ "Packet Forensics - M1 Device". Wayback Machine (FEB 06 2011). Archived from the original on 2011-02-06. Retrieved 26 August 2022.
- ↑ Neyman, Alexey. "Bug 2788 - Allow captures over TCP connections". Wireshark Bug Database. Retrieved 25 August 2022.
- ↑ "Arkime Settings". Retrieved 25 August 2022.
- ↑ "Pcap-over-IP in NetworkMiner". 7 September 2011. Retrieved 25 August 2022.
- ↑ "PCAP-over-IP server written in Golang". GitHub. Retrieved 24 October 2023.
- ↑ "pcappa2: Network traffic analysis tool for Attack & Defense CTF's". GitHub. Retrieved 28 November 2025.
- ↑ "Shovel: Web interface to explore Suricata EVE outputs". GitHub. Retrieved 28 November 2025.
- ↑ "tulip: Network analysis tool for Attack Defence CTF". GitHub. Retrieved 28 November 2025.
- ↑ "Pipes - TCP socket". Wireshark Wiki. Retrieved 25 August 2022.
- ↑ "PCAP-over-IP". Xplico Wiki. Retrieved 25 August 2022.
- ↑ "zeek-pcapovertcp-plugin". GitHub. Retrieved 6 September 2023.