Route integrity is the assurance that network traffic reaches its destination through the intended routing path, without unauthorized changes, diversion, or interception. It is a network-security property, not just a performance concern: if routes are altered, attackers may be able to observe, drop, delay, or modify traffic before it reaches a trusted service.
This matters because many security controls assume the path between systems is trustworthy. In practice, route integrity is threatened by attacks such as BGP hijacking, route leaks, or malicious man-in-the-middle placement on upstream networks. If an attacker can reroute traffic to a software update server, authentication service, or management plane, they may turn a normal connection into a delivery channel for malware or credential theft. Defenders protect route integrity with route filtering, RPKI validation, monitoring for unexpected path changes, and strong verification of downloaded content so that trust does not depend on the network path alone.