Dispelling the Myth of Wireless Security (O'ReillyNet)

[Posted August 15, 2003 by ris]

Rob Flickenger, author of Wireless Hacks, circumvents security on a standard 802.11b network, on O'ReillyNet. "[Even] if all standard precautions are in place, how much "security" do wireless access points actually provide? Having heard all sorts of widely varying estimates and assumptions from people who should be able to make an educated guess, I finally decided to see for myself what it would take to circumvent the security of my own standard 802.11b network."

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Posted Aug 15, 2003 21:13 UTC (Fri) by macemoneta (guest, #2717) [Link]

I've never been able to change the MAC address of a wireless card. While changing the software configuration is easy, the actual transmitted MAC address was not altered (the card firmware ignored the change). The only way around this that I know is to use an 802.11b Ethernet bridge (like the Linksys WET11), which must pass the MAC to function, and connects to a regular NIC (whose MAC can be changed). I'm curious to know if the actual transmitted MAC was altered, or if some other change was made (patched firmware?).

Dispelling the Myth of Wireless Security (O'ReillyNet)

Posted Aug 15, 2003 23:29 UTC (Fri) by pglennon (guest, #649) [Link]

it is even easy on windows, there is a registry key you change, and presto! new MAC address.

Dispelling the Myth of Wireless Security (O'ReillyNet)

Posted Aug 16, 2003 2:32 UTC (Sat) by rjamestaylor (guest, #339) [Link]

I agree. I usually use Orinoco-style cards: promiscous mode, MAC-address changable on the fly... no regedit hacking necessary on Windows.

In fact, I just got a new Dell laptop today and (checking) the "Dell TrueMobile 1300 WLAN Mini-PCI Properties" Advanced tab has an option to set the "Locally Administered MAC Address". It uses a Broadcom BCM4306 / BCM2050 chipset...

Not hard at all.