[liberationtech] [guardian-dev] Randomize MAC of Android phone?

[Julian Oliver]

..on Sun, Oct 27, 2013 at 03:15:12PM +0100, Timur Mehrvarz wrote:
> On 24.10.2013 20:48, coderman wrote:
> > On Thu, Oct 24, 2013 at 5:23 AM, Timur Mehrvarz
> > <timur.mehrvarz at riseup.net> wrote:
> >> ...
> >> The Android Wifi kernel drivers seem to not implement the functionality
> >> behind 'ifconfig wlan0 hw ether' (what is behind the ioctl call being
> >> used by ifconfig).
> > 
> > 
> > i've had success with HTC, LG, and Samsung devices. less so with
> > Motorola or newer hardware.
> 
> Can you name the device models you had success with? Maybe explain how
> you changed the MAC address on those? Is it always the same procedure?
> 
> > 
> > this is not really the kernel itself, but rather the wifi chipset - a
> > new kernel on the devices you're having trouble with won't fix this
> > ioctl.
> > 
> > unfortunately this problem is getting worse, not better.
> > 
> 
> Hmm, I see. In this case it would be really good to have a
> positive/negative list in regard to Wifi chipsets.

Would be good to see a build of 'macchanger' for Android. I use it on init on my
laptop with the vendor option. Gives a unique MAC addr but with the first fields
corresponding to known vendors, like so:

    ifconfig wlan0 down
    macchanger -A wlan0
    ifconfig wlan0 up

Here's the manpage:

NAME
       macchanger - MAC Changer

SYNOPSIS
       macchanger [options] device

DESCRIPTION
       macchanger is a Linux utility for viewing/manipulating the MAC address
for network interfaces.

OPTIONS
       macchanger accepts the following options:

       -h, --help
              Show summary of options.

       -V, --version
              Show version of program.

       -e, --ending
              Don't change the vendor bytes.

       -a, --another
              Set random vendor MAC of the same kind.

       -A     Set random vendor MAC of any kind.

       -r, --random
              Set fully random MAC.

       -p, --permanent
              Reset MAC address to its original, permanent hardware value.

       -l, --list[=keyword]
              Print known vendors (with keyword in the vendor's description
              string)

       -m, --mac XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX, --mac=XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
              Set the MAC XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX

       -s, --show
              Prints the current MAC

EXAMPLE
       macchanger -A eth1

Cheers,

-- 
Julian Oliver
PGP 36EED09D
http://julianoliver.com
http://criticalengineering.org