What's the best way to wiretap a network?

Sun Jan 18 21:28:45 UTC 2004

 > You can plug a mini-hub in line and use that as a tap point to monitor
 > the stream. Up side is its cheap and easy. Down side is you have to
 > drop to half duplex. Not a problem in most situations but in some the
 > drop in performance can be an issue.

Don't throw out your old hubs. It's hard to find a 10/100 hub for sale 
any more. Even the cheap consumer devices are switches. I picked up a 
$25 hub at Fry's a few weeks ago just in case I ever wanted to casually 
snoop some traffic. But Fry's is sold out.

The netoptics.com link posted was "priceless". I'm always wary of
simple products that are expensive enough to have a request for quote,
rather than a price, on their web page.