Connected Devices Not Showing Device

[WarrenHolt]

Running pcWRT Newifi-D2 v2.5.8 with just 2.4GHz WiFi on a Windows 10 machine.
The connected devices section on the status page used to show my granddaughter’s iPad device along with all the other devices that were connected. However, that is no longer the case. I know she is connected to and using WiFi but there is NO status at all for her device anymore. All the other devices I expect to see are there but not hers. Ideas? Info? Help?

[support]

Did you see any unnamed devices in the list? I.e., a device with a hostname displayed in gray?

iPad can be configured to connect with a random MAC address. When the router sees a MAC address without a registered hostname, it displays the hostname in gray.

[WarrenHolt]

To answer your question: no “unknown” device has been presented. Now, there is more:

I had a goal to apply an access calendar to restrict access to a range of time for a PhilipsRokuTV_356 TV in my granddaughter’s room

I had setup a TV Profile and set: CleanBrowsing Family Filter DNS Server, Safe Search, and Enable Access Control
After making sure no other device was affected by the profile, I applied an Access Calendar to restrict TV use from 10:00pm to 7:00am on School nights.
When my granddaughter came home tonight (the 31st), she said her iPhone did not have internet access. I looked and saw the pcWRT “access not allowed” (or such) screen was displayed on her phone.
I logged into the router and her iPhoneSE device was not present in the Connected Devices list, even after I did a refresh. And when I say it is not present, I mean there is also no “unknown” entry present.
I was able to find out her MAC address and looked in Settings-Network-Hostnames and Static Leases and found the MAC address and the Hostname I had given it at first: “April_iPhoneSE”.
I pressed the “-” (minus button) next to the Hostname and removed it from the list, thinking it would show up on the Connected Devices list. I waited for perhaps 2 minutes or so. Then even after I did a refresh or two, it was not showing and neither was an “unknown” device present.
So I rebooted the router.
After the reboot, I again checked the Connected Devices list – and the device and “unknown” was still not there, even after a refresh. But all the devices I expected to see were there.
I when to the Hostnames and Static Leases and again found the MAC address / “April_iPhoneSE” Hostname in the listing – at the same IP it had before I pressed the minus button.
I went to the TV profile. When the TV was brought to the house, it presented two device connections which I named “Aprils_TV” and “PhilipsRokuTV_356.
I removed “PhilipsRokuTV_356” from the TV profile and checked if her iPhone was now connecting. It wasn’t.
I put “PhilipsRokuTV_356” back and removed “Aprils_TV” and checked if her iPhone was now connecting. It WAS – but the Connected Devices list still did not show it or an “unknown” device. However, both “PhilipsRokuTV_356” and “Aprils_TV” are in the list as well as the others I would expect.
I have checked the three devices and all have different MAC addresses AND different IP addresses.
In the Bandwidth App, I also see the bandwidth I saw when she was watching TV when I did not want her to. And the traffic is associated with “Aprils_TV”

So I presently am unable to achieve my goal, although I have NO idea what is going on!

[support]

Let’s get the devices identified first.

After you connect a device to the router, start a browser on the device and open the router admin page. Usually this is http://192.168.10.1, but if you’ve changed the LAN IP address, adjust the IP address accordingly.

You’ll see the login page. Click on the link “My local IP address” – you’ll see the device’s IP address.

On the computer you use to manage the router, login the router admin site. Check the list of connected devices. Do you see the above IP address in the list?

[WarrenHolt]

I have checked with my Wife’s iPad and my Android phone. The IP reported on each device is the same that is being reported in the connected devices list when I log into the router. Also, these are in both in the Hostnames and Static Leases listing as I strive to make all the IPs static to help keep tabs on who’s accessing the network.

[support]

Can you see the iPad that was originally reported missing?

[WarrenHolt]

Of all the times I have logged into my router today (more than 5), I have NEVER seen my granddaughters phone (April_iPhoneSE) in the Connected Devices list. I DO see all the devices I expect to see, however – an iPad, my phone, my wife’s phone, two entries for the Roku TV. And I have performed the list refresh more than once.

[support]

Did you check the IP address on your granddaughters phone and that IP address is not listed under Connected Devices?

[WarrenHolt]

The connected devices listing does not show her IP and does not show “unknown”. I checked her device and the IP her iPhone presented is NOT the IP I have for the MAC address of her phone. The IP is for the April_TV which is a different MAC address.

If I remember correctly, from what I have been reading today, an iPhone has the ability to change it’s MAC address depending upon what router / network they connect to. Yea, just checked – https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202068 – Scroll down to the MAC address filtering – one bullet point reads: To help protect user privacy, some Apple devices use a different MAC address for each Wi-Fi network.

Then following the given link and reading the “About private Wi-Fi addresses” is this: Starting with iOS 15, iPadOS 15, and watchOS 8, if your device hasn’t joined the network in 6 weeks, it uses a different private address the next time it connects to that network. And if you make your device forget the network, it will also forget the private address it used with that network, unless it has been less than 2 weeks since the last time it was made to forget that network.

I don’t believe my granddaughter has disconnected from my WiFi for 6 weeks but she sure ends up utilizing WiFi from all over and perhaps that triggered the “change the MAC address” that apple has built in.

I am old school so I think MAC addresses are locked to a device. OBVIOUSLY that is no longer the case.

Any bright ideas how you guys are going to be able to combat this or any ideas for me? Sometimes technology really bothers me!

Ok, I did more reading from Apple info – ref: https://support.apple.com/en-us/102509 and there is a section for Network Administrators:

If you manage a Wi-Fi router that’s configured to notify you when a new device joins the network, you are notified when a device first joins with a private address.

Businesses and other organizations might need to update their Wi-Fi network security to work with private addresses. Or they can use an MDM-defined network profile to turn off Private Address for enrolled devices that join their Wi-Fi network. Learn more about private Wi-Fi addresses and enterprise networks.

And that last part of the paragraph is a link. I will let you find and follow it, if you desire.

I also think this is some of the same stuff the School is performing because I have had to capture her School laptop with more than one IP / MAC.

If you have any brilliant ideas, I am open to them!

[WarrenHolt]

One thing still open for understanding is: when I pressed the minus button next to a static entry in the Hostnames and Static Leases listing, why wasn’t the entry REALLY removed?

[support]

You need to click the Save button at the bottom of the page after you remove the static IP address entry.

To your previous post, yes MAC address can be changed. Sometimes you can change it to anything you want. It seemed that your grand daughter’s iPad was taking the MAC address that belonged to April_TV. You can check the actual MAC address used under a WiFi connection when a “private Wi-Fi addresses” is used.

To deal with the situation where a random MAC address may be used for a device, you can put the most restrictive policies on the Anonymous profile. Thus if a user wants to have less restricted access to the Internet, they’ll want to to use the native MAC address on the device.

[Author]

Posts