SMSC Hijacking

In telecommunications, SMSC Hijacking is the abuse of weak interconnect authentication to redirect or inject SMS traffic through an attacker-controlled SMSC, enabling interception of one-time passwords, SMS spoofing, or large-scale spam delivery. SMS Home Routing and SS7 firewalling are key mitigations.

Categories: Core NetworkSignalingRoaming and Interconnect

SMSC Hijacking in context

The mobile core carries subscriber sessions, mobility and policy. In 4G it is the EPC (MME, HSS, S/PGW); in 5G it is the Service-Based Architecture with AMF, SMF, UPF, AUSF, UDM and the NRF.

Signaling protocols carry the control-plane messages that set up calls, register subscribers and route SMS. SS7, Diameter, GTP-C and SIP are the four dominant families, and interconnect exposure of any of them is treated by GSMA as top-tier telecom risk.

To place SMSC Hijacking in the wider telecom-security picture, review HLR, MAP, SMS Home Routing, GTP-U Smuggling, GGSN and MAP Security: each entry cross-references back to this page so you can walk the topic in either direction.

Related terms

Related topic hubs

  • Signaling Firewall Unified SS7/Diameter/GTP/SMS signaling firewall framework.
  • SS7 Firewall GSMA FS.11 category 1/2/3 SS7 message screening at the STP edge.
  • SMS Firewall SMS spam, phishing, A2P bypass and MAP-layer SMS filtering.
  • Roaming Security IPX/GRX interconnect risk, home-routed vs local-breakout, SEPP.

More from the TelcoSec Glossary

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