[X4U] MAC address vs ? Ethernet Address ?

[Robert Ameeti]

At 10:32 AM -0400, 8/4/05, Richard Gilmore wrote:

>So the card itself is not hard wired with a number?

Yes it is. You can't change the hard wired MAC... but all information 
that any person sees is only after software analyzes and reports it. 
And thus what you see on the screen is not always what is real. Only 
if you open up the computer and read the label on the interface card 
will you really know what the MAC address is for a particular 
interface.

It is always possible, sometimes necessary, but in reality rare that 
a person would need to 'spoof' a MAC address.  The most common time 
now a days would be when your ISP is looking for a specific MAC 
address to allow entry to the network by a specific computer. You 
gave them a MAC address for a specific computer when you originally 
signed up. But today, you want to use a router between your computer 
and their DSL/Cable modem/router and to do this you might have your 
router display a 'spoofed' MAC address to cause the ISP to think that 
the computer that they want to allow onto their network is the one 
requesting access instead of the router that you are choosing to use 
today.

So as you can see, most any system can be worked around in a time of 
'need' by a user who knows his way around the system. Kinda like what 
you see in the movies. ;-)
-- 

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Robert Ameeti

English is a funny language. A fat chance and a slim chance are the same thing.
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