Can I use tcpdump to get HTTP requests, response header and response body?

There are tcpdump filters for HTTP GET & HTTP POST (or for both plus message body):

  • Run man tcpdump | less -Ip examples to see some examples

  • Here’s a tcpdump filter for HTTP GET (GET = 0x47, 0x45, 0x54, 0x20):

    sudo tcpdump -s 0 -A 'tcp[((tcp[12:1] & 0xf0) >> 2):4] = 0x47455420'
    
  • Here’s a tcpdump filter for HTTP POST (POST = 0x50, 0x4f, 0x53, 0x54):

    sudo tcpdump -s 0 -A 'tcp dst port 80 and (tcp[((tcp[12:1] & 0xf0) >> 2):4] = 0x504f5354)'
    
  • Monitor HTTP traffic including request and response headers and message body (source):

    tcpdump -A -s 0 'tcp port 80 and (((ip[2:2] - ((ip[0]&0xf)<<2)) - ((tcp[12]&0xf0)>>2)) != 0)'
    tcpdump -X -s 0 'tcp port 80 and (((ip[2:2] - ((ip[0]&0xf)<<2)) - ((tcp[12]&0xf0)>>2)) != 0)'
    

For more information on the bit-twiddling in the TCP header see: String-Matching Capture Filter Generator (link to Sake Blok’s explanation).

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