During the 70s all the domain name to IP address was contained in a single file called the HOSTS.TXT file. A single for only a few hundred machines on the internet. Of course the load began to grow and eventually a different system supplanted it. The hosts file is now used primarily as a backup (or a cache) if the name servers are inaccessible.
A hosts file is an important system file which will store the information about where to find or locate a particular PC on a network.In Other words it maps the Domain or host names to the IP addresses.So now we can consider the hosts file as a local system version of the DNS.
Where can I find my hosts file?
The location of the hosts file depend s on your OS.
for Win NT/XP/2003/Vista/7 you can search in"
for Win 95/98/ME < system drive>\windows
for UNIX search in /etc
The format of each entry is:
[internet address] [domain name] [alias]
209.85.135.191 hackingwithswar.blogspot.com localhost
Do not remove the localhost entry.
TIPS :
We can speedup our browsing speed a bit by adding the details of the frequently visited sites in the hosts file in the correct format.
We can block users from accessing certain sites from our system by editing the hosts file to go to the loopback addresss everytime they type the blocked address on the browser.
The administrators can spread the edited hosts file to all the systems to prevent access to blocked sites.
Ok, Now we can use the DNS spoofing to play pranks on our friends. But teach them what you did at the end of the play and be sure not to hurt them anyway , say, by directing them to some pornographic sites everytime they type google.com in their browser or so. ;)
We can also create a smart virus to overwrite the hosts file everytime
The phishing attack can be done effectively using this method.
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