"Merge" Devices
Occasionally a device's IP will change for a legitimate, though often unforeseen, reason. Mobile phones like to use dynamic MAC's, so they get new IP's all the time. A VM on a virtual switch may get a new IP if the switch is altered or recreated.
What I've seen in Firewalla when this happens is a "new" device with the same name and a new IP. The "old" device goes offline and stagnant until I delete it or it obsolesces on its own. The "new" device is not in the group I assigned the "old" device to, and has none of its history.
Can we get an option to "merge" these devices so that the settings and traffic history remain consistent throughout IP/MAC changes? It could be as simple as a button on the alarm for the "new" device, letting you indicate that yes, it's really the same device, merge them.
-
A better solution would be to disable the devices from changing MAC ... we thought about your solution as well, it just won't work, because people will not look at the alarms and do the merge, and it will create all sorts of problems; the problems are mainly if you have policies applied to devices.
-
"because people will not look at the alarms and do the merge"
I don't see how this is a roadblock, since it would make no difference to such people if the option were added.
"the problems are mainly if you have policies applied to devices"
What sort of problems? Would it be difficult to transfer policies assigned to the "old" device to the "new" one with a button click? And as for policies, are we really referring to assigned rules/groups?
-
The problem here is really device changing MAC ... And how to support random MAC. For that, we highly recommend turning off MAC randomization when you are connecting at home, this way, the behavior of the system is predictable. At the moment, only apple devices randomizes MAC addresses even if they are connected to the same wifi... android will always use one MAC on the same wifi.
Your device can change IP addresses, firewalla will still be able to track and apply policies to it by monitoring the MAC address.
-
+1
Either a button/menu option on the alarm, or even a "merge devices" UI where you can select devices to merge.@David
Maybe for these known devices, make a group for them, so the rules and stats stay aggregated?
The problem with that being you can't assign the device to more than one group.
Please sign in to leave a comment.
Comments
4 comments