How do I block someone in my neighbourhood from hijacking the SSID of my wifi every time I change it

Someone in my neighbourhood is changing the SSID of their wifi to mine every time I change it. My computer always joins their version because they are making their signal stronger than mine. I believe they are trying to get my computer to auto connect to their wlan for bad reasons, either way, I never get onto my network and internet because of this. I need to block their BSSID Mac code of their router. This should be easy. How do I do this?

Posted on Dec 12, 2015 3:56 PM

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MrHoffman

Level 10

146,407 points

Posted on Dec 12, 2015 5:51 PM

They're probably running what's known as a Pineapple, or some similar device that implements the Evil Twin. I've encountered such devices in use, and they're all vacuuming up credentials. It's not fun to deal with these.

This is a limitation in how most systems — not just OS X — access Wi-Fi networks, so you can switch to WPA2 or hidden or whatever else, and it won't help.

The only way you might avoid this is to use a wired connection, or to avoid storing the password for your Wi-Fi network, and enter it each time. See this and this.

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19 replies

sberman

Level 10

272,730 points

Dec 12, 2015 4:16 PM in response to rupertjones

rupertjones wrote:

If I join my new password protected SSID immediately that is fine ....

Good. And, as I said, if your computer remembers your joined network, it will continue to join yours.

sberman

Level 10

272,730 points

Dec 12, 2015 4:27 PM in response to Linc Davis

I always appreciate learning new things from you. Here is another instance. Thanks!

rupertjones Author

Level 1

4 points

Dec 12, 2015 4:59 PM in response to Linc Davis

Will do. So is there no way of joining or filtering or blocking a BSSID/mac address of a wifi hotspot then?

rupertjones Author

Level 1

4 points

Dec 12, 2015 5:46 PM in response to Linc Davis

No. I want to block their mac address, not the SSID that is the same as mine.

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How do I block someone in my neighbourhood from hijacking the SSID of my wifi every time I change it