A method for an intermediate node to locate a fault independently, where the intermediate node serves to forward a packet between a first end node and a second end node, the method includes: creating a test packet and sending the test packet to the first end node, where the test packet includes address information of the second end node, and the test packet is used to trigger the first end node to send a response packet to the second end node; forwarding the response packet from the first end node to the second end node; capturing the response packet; and analyzing, according to a result of the packet capturing, whether a packet from the first end node to the second end node can be forwarded normally.