Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP)
Security+ 🏆 • Protocols 🔗 • Network Security 🌐
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Difficulty: free
Definition
DHCP is a network protocol that automatically assigns IP configuration to devices, including an IP address, subnet mask, default gateway, and DNS servers. It reduces manual setup and helps networks manage addressing consistently at scale.
Examples
- A laptop joins a corporate Wi-Fi network and receives an IP address, gateway, and DNS settings automatically from a DHCP server.
- A home router acts as a DHCP server, leasing addresses like 192.168.1.100 to devices for a set amount of time.
Discover 🔎
Every device on an IP network needs basic settings before it can communicate. If you had to configure IP address, gateway, and DNS manually on every laptop, phone, printer, and IoT device, networks would be slow to deploy and easy to misconfigure. DHCP solves this by automatically handing out these settings and keeping track of which device has which address.
Remember: DHCP does not just give an IP address. It usually provides the full set of network settings a device needs to function.
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