Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) is an internet protocol of the OSI Application layer 7. It collects and organizes information about managed devices on IP networks and modifies that information to change device behavior.
It is widely used for network management and network monitoring. It provides information about network resources such as cable modems, routers, switches, servers, workstations, printers, hosts, devices, shares, etc. and network information such as ARP tables, routing tables, traffic, etc.
SNMP consists of a manager and an agent; agents are embedded on every network device, and the manager is installed on a separate computer.
SNMP holds two passwords to access and configure the SNMP agent from the management station:
- Read community string: It is public by default; allows viewing of device/system configuration
- Read/write community string: It is private by default; allows remote editing of configuration
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External References
- “Simple Network Management Protocol“; Wikipedia