Are we all handing to Google the SSID of our home routers?

Alice J. schrieb am 2016-01-31 um 22:19:

No - you need a Google account which can also be used to access Google Play. There is no "Google Play Account" - it's all just one service.

This is also just a Google account.

And yes - Google may notice that you access with different accounts from the same IP addresses all the time and may find this suspicious. Because that's just the same behaviour hackers show when they abuse stolen accounts.

I just donated 4 Linksys WRT54GL v1.1 wireless routers to Goodwill a few days ago. I think they turn around and sell them for about $10 each, last time I checked. So thrift stores might be an option for used (cheap) gear, and possibly pawn shops or craigslist or ebay.

Isn't it also the same behavior displayed by everyone who uses multiple GMail accounts? I have several accounts and I don't see anything suspicious about it.

In "my" case, I use VPN all the time, so, Google was getting upset that the *same* email account kept logging in from a variety of IP addresses.

I don't know if the fact I use user-agent switchers also gave them concern. But, up until very recently (months), Google was OK with that.

Now, after only a week or so of VPN, Google closes my account, even if I never sent a single email from it (unless I give them a phone number).

The famous Linksys WRT54G!

I wonder, to the point that Jeff Liebermann mentioned, if we can modify the operating system to be able to change the LAN MAC address on those things?

I don't have the skills, but, people who write DDWRT might have those skills.

As a thought experiment, is it *possible* to change the MAC on the wireless LAN of those routers if you have DDWRT installed on it?

Or yardsales. We've bought previous-generation routers for $5.

On Sun, 31 Jan 2016 20:57:28 +0000 (UTC), Alice J. asks:

Good? that's a matter of personal taste. Permanent? that no one can reasonably predict with certainty.

Free (but not Google or Yahoo)? att.net, netzero.net, aol.com, live.com, msn.com, hotmail.com, outlook.com, onmicrosoft.com are a few I know, all US-based. There are others in France, Germany, Italy, Poland, elsewhere.

HTH. Cheers, -- tlvp

I've tried some of them (e.g., outlook/hotmail, live/microsoft, etc., and they all REQUIRED a telephone number to set up the account.

I'll need to delve deeper but a phone-free account may no longer exist.

Register a domain of your own and host it on a decent hosting provider and the job's done. I have been using my own isbd.co.uk E-Mail for many, many years with no problems. It's not even *that* difficult to change hosting and keep the E-Mail and domain. isbd.co.uk has been through three (or is it just two) providers over the years. It's currently with TsoHost whom I would thoroughly recommend.

Mine's now retired, running openWRT on a WNDR3800 instead.

just tried

ifconfig wlan0 down ifconfig wlan0 hw ether 08:BD:43:XX:XX:XX ifconfig wlan0 up

on mine to change the MAC for the 2.4GHz Atheros radio (as I'm SSH'ed over the 5.2GHz radio wlan1) and it seems to have taken the new address OK. Presumably it will take a locally administered address too, whether it'll take some other random manufacturer's OUI prefix, I don't know.

If you read the part of your own post that you snipped in responding to mine, you'll see that you specified everyone use the same SSID and the same associated MAC. That isn't the same as everyone choosing their own SSID and some random MAC number to associate with it. You suggested the WiFi equivalent of all the slaves shouting 'I am Spartacus'.

It's dead easy to change the MAC number of the WiFi network card associated with a given SSID; change the WiFi network card in the router, or use a software router and 'clone' the MAC, or just change the router. I've had the same SSID for years on a sequence of cheap ADSL modem/routers.

The SSID lets your devices identify which access points are friendly. The MAC associated with the SSID identifies which network card is offering that SSID hereabouts at the moment.

If you're cloning or spoofing a MAC for an access point just check the other access points within range to make sure you don't duplicate one already in use (all WiFi routers broadcast their MACs, and there are free apps for Android phones that will show the details of all the access points within range - I can see 15 right now; no dead beef cafe but I have spotted that one sometimes, it rather draws attention to itself).

If anyone is sufficiently interested in you to be trying to track your internet access then they're almost certainly tracking your car and public transport usage too. And probably all the CCTV and security cameras and web cams that might get a look at you as well. Not that I want to encourage paranoia of course.

Just to make it interesting, there's a difference between a Google Account and a Google Apps account. Neither needs a Gmail account - although a Google Account comes for free when you register a Gmail account.

I keep reading articles like this one below but I'm not sure I'm a lot wiser. I do notice the "a" in "account" is sometimes uppercase and sometimes lowercase and it makes an important distinction which is largely lost on me.

Of course, apps like Chrome, YouTube, Maps, etc may be signing you in with your Google account if, when they are first launched, you accepted Google's popup offer to access added value services.

I wonder if Google tracks the router's MAC address. That would allow Google to group together any users of the same MAC address in its records.

Surely Google encrypts that data stream? I hope!

Does deleting a Google account on Android delete a browser's Google cookies? I wouldn't think it did.

That would mean Google is able to associate all your Google searches across all the Google accounts on that Android device.

It will only get the router's wireless Mac address when it comes within a practical maximum of 100 meters. I seem to remember Google getting into trouble for allowing their street view cars to gather anything more than the SSID/BSSID. Actually doing a full war-drive to sniff packages is what they will catch shit for.

Mike "almost got them kicked out of Germany" Yetto

So it is writ by pamela , so mote it be.

Switch to . They don't save search histories.

Mike "change your phone's google advertising id more often" Yetto