Man-in-the-Middle Attacks: How Public Wi-Fi Can Expose Your Data

A Man-in-the-Middle attack lets a malicious party secretly sit between a user's device and the server they are contacting, reading or altering the data passing through. Such attacks are especially common on public Wi-Fi at airports, cafes, and hotels, where attackers may set up fake hotspots with convincing names. Techniques like ARP spoofing can redirect a device's traffic through the attacker's machine, exposing unencrypted passwords and enabling fake login pages. Because traffic is not blocked, victims often continue browsing without noticing their data is being captured. Using HTTPS, which encrypts data between the browser and server, is a key defense against interception.