German police ask for help in identifying a bomber's MAC address

Re:German police ask for help in identifying a bomber's MAC ... by dehrmann on Saturday January 12, 2019 @06:17PM (#18893878)

Sure, they can be spoofed, but do nic vendors try to keep them unique, or do they reuse them from a pool, like after the card is 10+ years old?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:German police ask for help in identifying a bomber's MAC ... by peterwwillis on Sunday January 13, 2019 @02:57PM (#18898334)

"It depends."

Sometimes vendors would burn duplicates by accident. Sometimes they would simply run out and production would loop (there's "only" 16.7mil addrs per manufacturer prefix). Sometimes they print the same run in different geographical areas, because the MAC only matters in a broadcast domain. Often they just wouldn't keep track of what they assigned.

I just think it's funny to realize that people read "unique (to a broadcast domain)" and assumed that could mean "unique (everywhere)" because it's a really big number.

[ Parent | on HN ]