BEFSR41 - Mac Cloning

[thesmashest]

Hi,

I have a "Linksys BEFSR41 - EtherFast® Cable/DSL Router with 4-Port Switch". I would like to know what is mac cloning and does it make the router more secure?

Also, what are some modifications that you can make to the router to make it more secure (like: filtering port 113)..etc

Thank you

 

[cdeer]

Some ISPs do not want you to have a home network and have a modem that allows only 1 MAC to talk on the internet. The LinkSys can clone the computer MAC that was originally used to set up the modem/connection so that the modem thinks the router is the original computer.

 

[bcastner]

Many cable systems require MAC authentication. The MAC is a unique hardware ID for an ethernet interface. Ad cdeer described above, you can clone your ethernet adapter used to intialize your cable account to the Linksys, thus "fooling" the cable system into believing the original authenticating workstation is connected.

Do an ipconfig /all on your original setup workstation for the cable connection. The MAC address will be reported as the "Physical address" of the computer. Enter it without spaces.

I have never seen a DSL system require the cloning feature.

As for the rest of your question:
Disable remote access to the router setup
Enter a strong and secure password on the router setup
Keep your firmware up-to-date from Linksys.

 

[1ld84h]

Our ISP allowed us to purchase a modem and provide them the MAC address. Our setup (Linksys hardware) is modem-router-PC. We changed to a wireless enabled router and are having connectivity issues. I want to eliminate authentication as the problem. For authentication, is ISP using requested modem MAC, the original router's MAC or the first PC it came across? Thanks