Linksys WRT54GS with WRE54G Extender.....MAC address block questions

Hi.
I have my WRT54GS locked down by MAC address. My neighbor has assured
me he can access my wireless connection and get to the Internet.
Running latest Firmware for version 4 and also running Windows XP SP2.
Of course I changed the password on the router and range extender.

I do not have WAP or WEP enabled since my friend comes over and uses
her laptop (IBOOK) which has a problem with Airport recognizing WEP or
WPA. Thus I locked things down my MAC address (prevent only these IP
addresses...)

****How is it that my neighbor can even access my connection for normal
web surfing? He is not spoofing anything or trying anything funky.


Thanks for educating me.

Sincerely
Patty

(E-Mail Removed) hath wroth:

>I have my WRT54GS locked down by MAC address. My neighbor has assured
>me he can access my wireless connection and get to the Internet.
>Running latest Firmware for version 4 and also running Windows XP SP2.
>Of course I changed the password on the router and range extender.
>
>I do not have WAP or WEP enabled since my friend comes over and uses
>her laptop (IBOOK) which has a problem with Airport recognizing WEP or
>WPA. Thus I locked things down my MAC address (prevent only these IP
>addresses...)

Bingo. Not "prevent". Use "permit" instead. Install the MAC
addresses in the table that want to allow to connect. Don't include
your neighbors radio. That should keep them out.
| http://www.linksysdata.com/ui/WRT54G...ter-Enable.htm

>****How is it that my neighbor can even access my connection for normal
>web surfing? He is not spoofing anything or trying anything funky.

Also, verify that your neighbor is connecting to your WRT54G and not
someone elses.

--
Jeff Liebermann (E-Mail Removed)
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

>From Original Poster (OP): I do not know if this will help but I
disabled the SSID broadcast. With my Wi-Fi checker, it shows the SSID
is cloaked.

I had the SPI firewall turned on on the WRT54G and could not access the
Range Extender WRE54G via 192.168.1.240 (even with a hard reset) so I
had to turn that SPI off.

Perhaps the cloaking will help since the MAC address filtering did not
seem to be preventing my neighbor from getting internet access to my
wireless network.

Patty

[POSTED TO alt.internet.wireless - REPLY ON USENET PLEASE]

In <(E-Mail Removed) .com> on 13 May 2006
11:39:14 -0700, (E-Mail Removed) wrote:

>I have my WRT54GS locked down by MAC address. My neighbor has assured
>me he can access my wireless connection and get to the Internet.
>Running latest Firmware for version 4 and also running Windows XP SP2.
>Of course I changed the password on the router and range extender.
>
>I do not have WAP or WEP enabled since my friend comes over and uses
>her laptop (IBOOK) which has a problem with Airport recognizing WEP or
>WPA.

That should be easily fixable.

>Thus I locked things down my MAC address (prevent only these IP
>addresses...)

MAC filtering is easily spoofed.

--
Best regards, SEE THE FAQ FOR ALT.INTERNET.WIRELESS AT
John Navas <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/FAQ_for_alt.internet.wireless>

Sorry, Yes I had "Permit only these IP addresses....." and the
neighbors was not one of them. What I did was to disable SSID broadcast
and that seems to have helped.


I need neighbor to somehow duplicate access to my WIFI network to see
if what he is saying is true. With MAC address PERMIT ONLY I do not see
how he can access anything unless the repeater does not carry
prevention of MAC addresses. However the repeater should pass traffic
to the Router and all should be fine.

We shall see.

Thanks
Patty

(E-Mail Removed) wrote:
> Sorry, Yes I had "Permit only these IP addresses....." and the
> neighbors was not one of them. What I did was to disable SSID
> broadcast and that seems to have helped.
>
>
> I need neighbor to somehow duplicate access to my WIFI network to see
> if what he is saying is true. With MAC address PERMIT ONLY I do not
> see how he can access anything unless the repeater does not carry
> prevention of MAC addresses. However the repeater should pass traffic
> to the Router and all should be fine.
>
> We shall see.
>
> Thanks
> Patty

Once your neighbor's computer has connected to your computer... turning off
SSID will not help as the neighbor's computer has already "learned" your
SSID. You must change the SSID to something else.

(E-Mail Removed) hath wroth:

>Sorry, Yes I had "Permit only these IP addresses....." and the
>neighbors was not one of them. What I did was to disable SSID broadcast
>and that seems to have helped.
>
>
>I need neighbor to somehow duplicate access to my WIFI network to see
>if what he is saying is true. With MAC address PERMIT ONLY I do not see
>how he can access anything unless the repeater does not carry
>prevention of MAC addresses. However the repeater should pass traffic
>to the Router and all should be fine.
>
>We shall see.

Won't work. If you have the MAC address of the repeater in the permit
list, anything that goes through the repeater will successfully
connect to your access point. Your WRT54G is authenticating the MAC
address of the repeater, not the clients.

Also, turn SSID broadcast back on or you'll probably find your
neighbors networks running on your channel because he won't know that
you're already there.

--
Jeff Liebermann (E-Mail Removed)
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

Thanks. So take the repeater out of the PERMIT THESE mac
addresses......?

Why enable SSID broadcast?

Thanks so much. I do appreciate it.

Sincerely
Patty

(E-Mail Removed) hath wroth:

>Thanks. So take the repeater out of the PERMIT THESE mac
>addresses......?

Nope. Then nobody will be able to connect to your router through the
repeater. The only way to make this work and still retain the
repeater is to forget about MAC address filtering and fix the stupid
Apple problem. My guess is the usual ASCII to Hex WEP key conversion
problem. Use the Hex key or better yet, switch to WPA-PSK which
should work.

If that's not the problem, there's a chance you have a WRT4GS version
5, which has problems. You state that you have the latest firmware so
that's not it. (Assumption: The mother of all screwups). Would you
mind checking if you really do have the latest firmware?

The other possibility is that the repeater is a problem for the iBook.
Try removing the repeater (i.e. turn it off) and see if things work a
bit better. Note that the WRE54G needs to have the same encryption
type and key as the WRT54GS. See under "wireless security"
http://www.linksysdata.com/ui/WRE54G...1.10/setup.htm

>Why enable SSID broadcast?

So your neighbors know that you're there. If they can't see you,
they'll probably put their wireless systems on the same channel you're
using. The both of you can complain about how "unreliable" the
wireless seems to be, when in reality, you're just dealing with mutual
interference.

Also, some wireless clients just can't seem to function correctly
without seeing an SSID broadcast. Actually, these are few and far
between and can probably be ignored. However, I keep running into
problems that are magically fixed by turning on SSID broadcast.

--
Jeff Liebermann (E-Mail Removed)
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

(E-Mail Removed) wrote:
>Why enable SSID broadcast?

Because it adds nothing to security (all the common sniffing tools
find it anyway), not all clients work with hidden SSID, and it causes
interference when your neighbors can't tell it's there and put their
AP on the same channel.