this post was submitted on 23 Aug 2023
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Didn't know you could spoof a mac address
Most consumer-grade NICs have a default MAC address which is retrievable with device drivers, but delegate (Ethernet) packet assembly to the OS. If the OS asks the NIC to emit a packet, then the NIC often receives the packet as a blob, DMA'd from main memory, and emits the bytes as octets. Other NICs do manage packet assembly, but allow overwriting the default MAC address. By the time I was learning Linux, we had GNU MAC Changer available in userland with the
macchangercommand, and many distros have configuration for randomizing or hardcoding MAC addresses upon boot.I want to say that this is all because olden corporate network management policies could require a technician to replace a NIC without changing the MAC address, but more likely it is because framing and packet assembly was not traditionally handed to a second controller, and was instead bit-banged or MMIO'd by the CPU.
Some devices, like Android, do this automatically. By default they have randomized mac enabled.
Where is this setting?
https://files.catbox.moe/zyrnw1.png
Can't speak for other devices, but on my Samsung it's a network level setting in the "view more" section of the wifi network configuration.
It is buried... You go to your WiFi settings, select settings for the wifi you're connected to (the cog), and then the setting is called Privacy. The default is 'use randomized MAC', you can switch it to use device MAC.