Orbi WiFi 7 RBE973
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What are these Netgear devices?

donawalt
Mentor

What are these Netgear devices?

(Disregard model number I selected below, RBR850 is not an option)  Hi all, I have a RBR850 and 2 RBS850's, both of which are wired backhaul. All is working fine, but looking at orbilogin.com, I have noticed for a few days now that there are 2 devices in the Advanced/Security/Access Control/Currently not connected list, that I don't know what they are. They could have been there longer. One has the same name I gave to one of the RBS850's, and one just says "Netgear" as the device name. MAC addresses are different than any of the other RBx850 devices. What are they, and can/should I delete them, or are they in use but only connected very briefly or seomthing, so I never notice them connected?

Model: RBR50|Orbi AC3000 Tri-band WiFi Router
Message 1 of 5
CrimpOn
Guru

Re: What are these Netgear devices?

There is absolutely no risk in removing those entries from the "Devices not currently connected" table.  (Access Control has to be enabled to do so.)

 

There could be two factors at work here:

  • More and more devices these days have "Private MAC Address" as the default setting, which means that every time they connect to a new WiFi system, they create a bogus MAC address. And, if they 'forget' that they connected to a WiFi system before, they create a different bogus MAC address the next time. That means when I travel all over town and connect my phone to WiFi at Starbucks, the library, a hospital, my friend's house, etc. etc. all of them think I have a different phone at each place.  Impossible to 'track' where I have been.
  • Netgear includes software in the router which attempts to discover from the MAC address what the device might be.  Manufacturers have unique groups of MAC addresses used to make their WiFi modules.  There are even web sites where one can type in a MAC address and see who might have made it.  Such as... https://www.wireshark.org/tools/oui-lookup.html 
    But this software is not 100% perfect, and when devices create bogus MAC addresses, it really struggles.

More than you probably wanted to read..(sorry)  Erase them and don't look back.

Message 2 of 5
donawalt
Mentor

Re: What are these Netgear devices?

No I apprecited the explanation, thanks. So, I have Acces Control on, I selected, tapped remove from the list, the page refreshed, and when I expanded, they were still there! I did this twice! They don't seem to remove...?

 

PS - both are "Wired" is this why they won't remove? Even though they are not connected?

Message 3 of 5
CrimpOn
Guru

Re: What are these Netgear devices?


@donawalt wrote:

No I apprecited the explanation, thanks. So, I have Acces Control on, I selected, tapped remove from the list, the page refreshed, and when I expanded, they were still there! I did this twice! They don't seem to remove...?

 

PS - both are "Wired" is this why they won't remove? Even though they are not connected?


I removed both a WiFi and a Wired device from the "Allowed devices not currently attached".  Got the pop-up window, "Do you Really want to remove this device?" and clicked Yes.  They are both now gone.  It is hard to imagine that the RBR850 would be different from my RBR50 in regard to this function.  (Geez, I have a lot of crap that has been 'allowed' at one time or another!)

 

I have no idea what to suggest next.

Message 4 of 5
donawalt
Mentor

Re: What are these Netgear devices?

Well, on a whim I went to the Orbi app on my iPad, and they show up as offline devices underneath a satellite. I did "Delete this device", and now they are gone there and at orbilogin.net! Weird but they are gone. Hopefully they are nothing impoirtant lol. Thanks!

Message 5 of 5
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