WPA && associating with unknown SSID

[Pietro Cerutti]

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Sam Leffler wrote:
| Pietro Cerutti wrote:
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|> Sam Leffler wrote:
|> | Matthias Apitz wrote:
|> |> Hello,
|> |>
|> |> I'm using WPA to connect to my various Wifi AP's (office, home,
|> partner
|> |> locations) and have them well configured in the wpa_supplicant.conf(5)
|> |> file;
|> |>
|> |> from time to time at home I encounter that it is associating with an
|> |> unknown AP of my neighbourhood:
|> |>
|> |>
|> |> # ifconfig iwi0
|> |> iwi0: flags=8843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu
|> |> 1500
|> |>         ether 00:13:ce:a1:e6:81
|> |>         inet 192.168.2.3 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.168.2.255
|> |>         media: IEEE 802.11 Wireless Ethernet autoselect (DS/11Mbps)
|> |>         status: associated
|> |>         ssid o2DSL_kJaR channel 1 (2412 Mhz 11g) bssid
|> 00:19:cb:86:b3:84
|> |>         authmode OPEN privacy ON deftxkey 1 wepkey 1:40-bit bmiss 10
|> |>         scanvalid 60 bgscan bgscanintvl 300 bgscanidle 250
|> roam:rssi11g 7
|> |>         roam:rate11g 5 protmode CTS roaming MANUAL
|> |> # ifconfig iwi0 list scan
|> |> SSID            BSSID              CHAN RATE   S:N     INT CAPS
|> |> o2DSL_kJaR      00:19:cb:86:b3:84    1   54M  19:0    100 EP
|> |> xxxxxxxxxxxx    00:14:6c:44:aa:f6   11   54M  13:0    100 EP   WPA
|> |>
|> |> the network with SSID 'o2DSL_kJaR' is not im my
|> |> /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf;
|> |>
|> |> how this is possible and how can I prevent this?
|> |>
|> | You must have a wildcard entry in your wpa_supplicant.conf file (i.e.
|> | one w/o an ssid specified).
|>
|> Not necessarily. If you bring up a wlan interface and don't specify
|> anything, it will automatically associate with the first open AP it
|> finds.
|>
|> I don't know if it's to be considered a feature or a bug. I've been
|> worried by this sometimes, but honestly not enough to really care..
|>
|> Anyway, it happens...
|>
|
| He was talking about wpa_supplicant selecting an arbitrary AP.  If you
| have a device marked up then the system will handle ap selection+join
| but if wpa_supplicant is running then it marks the interface in "manual
| roaming mode" which stops that behaviour.

What if you bring up a device with "WPA" in its rc.conf ifconfig line?

|
|    Sam
|


- --
Pietro Cerutti
gahr at FreeBSD.org

PGP Public Key:
http://gahr.ch/pgp

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