Preventing DHCP Spoofing on MX Series 5G Universal Routing Platforms

A problem that sometimes occurs with DHCP is DHCP spoofing. in which an untrusted client floods a network with DHCP messages. Often these attacks utilize source IP address spoofing to conceal the true source of the attack.

DHCP snooping helps prevent DHCP spoofing by copying DHCP messages to the control plane and using the information in the packets to create anti-spoofing filters. The anti-spoofing filters bind a client’s MAC address to its DHCP-assigned IP address and use this information to filter spoofed DHCP messages. In a typical topology, a carrier edge router (in this function also referred to as the broadband services router [BSR]) connects the DHCP server and the MX Series router (or broadband services aggregator [BSA]) performing the snooping. The MX Series router connects to the client and the BSR.

DHCP snooping works as follows in the network topology mentioned above:

1. The client sends a DHCP discover message to obtain an IP address from the DHCP server.

2. The BSA intercepts the message and might add option 82 information specifying the slot, port, VPI/VCI, and so on.

3. The BSA then sends the DHCP discover message to the BSR, which converts it to a unicast packet and sends it to the DHCP server.

4. The DHCP server looks up the client’s MAC address and option 82 information in its database. A valid client is assigned an IP address, which is returned to the client using a DHCP offer message. Both the BSR and BSA send this message upstream to the client.

5. The client examines the DHCP offer, and if it is acceptable, issues a DHCP request message that is sent to the DHCP server through the BSA and BSR.

6. The DHCP server confirms that the IP address is still available. If it is, the DHCP server updates its local tables and sends a DHCP ACK message to the client.

7. The BSR receives the DHCP ACK message and passes the message to the BSA.

8. The BSA creates an anti-spoofing filter by binding the IP address in the ACK message to the MAC address of the client. After this point, any DHCP messages from this IP address that are not bound to the client’s MAC address are dropped.

9. The BSA sends the ACK message to the client so that the process of assigning a IP address can be completed.

You configure DHCP snooping by including within a DHCP group the appropriate interfaces of the BSA:

In a VPLS environment, DHCP requests are forwarded over pseudowires. You can configure DHCP snooping over VPLS at the [edit routing-instances routing-instance-name] hierarchy level.

DHCP snooping works on a per learning bridge basis in bridge domains. Each learning domain must have an upstream interface configured. This interface acts as the flood port for DHCP requests coming from the client side. DHCP requests are be forwarded across learning domains in a bridge domain. You can configure DHCP snooping on bridge domains at the [edit routing-instances routing-instance-name bridge-domains bridge-domain-name] hierarchy level.