K Patterson
Premium,MVM
join:2006-03-12
Columbus, OH
 ·RoadRunner Cable
| reply to DANCCS
Re: Security with Cable Modem and ComCast?
said by DANCCS :
Hi,
Essentially, all cable customers in the region belong to the same local area network (LAN). Without any security measures in place, anybody in the neighborhood might technically be able to click on their Windows Network Neighborhood icon and actually see the computer names and addresses of their neighbors on the service. If a customer enables file sharing on any drives, neighbors could even download copies of their data.
No. It is not one Lan. You cannot see the upstream of other customers, and they cannot see your downstream. Yes, the data is present on the coax, but it cannot be accessed with a cable modem. |
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grazed
join:2006-10-15
Havertown, PA
| said by K Patterson  :said by DANCCS :
Hi,
Essentially, all cable customers in the region belong to the same local area network (LAN). Without any security measures in place, anybody in the neighborhood might technically be able to click on their Windows Network Neighborhood icon and actually see the computer names and addresses of their neighbors on the service. If a customer enables file sharing on any drives, neighbors could even download copies of their data.
No. It is not one Lan. You cannot see the upstream of other customers, and they cannot see your downstream. Yes, the data is present on the coax, but it cannot be accessed with a cable modem. It sure can.
How do you think people run unregistered modems? Not that I know the technicalities of it all, but it relies on packet interception to retrieve config files, Serial numbers, and MAC ID's of neighboring modems. |
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EG
The wings of love
Premium
join:2006-11-18
Union, NJ | said by grazed :Not that I know the technicalities of it all, Hmmm.. |
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tmh
@comcast.net
| said by EG :said by grazed :Not that I know the technicalities of it all, Hmmm..  |
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MacLeech
The one and only
Premium
join:2001-07-14
SoCal
2 edits | reply to grazed
said by grazed :How do you think people run unregistered modems? That's a completely different issue then accessing your neighbor's computer.
I've hacked plenty of modems when it was possible and needed to know nothing from any other modem or end user computer on the network. It was between me and the ISP servers.
How do you propose the modem listens to the other modems on the local segment? It can't do it directly, it has to wait for the data processed by the CMTS.
This is also why the netBIOS and other OS level sharing ports are usually blocked at the modem and CMTS. |
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K Patterson
Premium,MVM
join:2006-03-12
Columbus, OH
·RoadRunner Cable
| reply to grazed
Yes, you can change the MAC of a cable modem by surgery. That would let you run an unregistered modem so long as the other modem with that MAC was turned off.
It is physically impossible to see a neighbor's upstream. The cable modem does not have a receiver that can be tuned to those frequencies. |
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Marcer
VIP
join:2007-07-08
Hamilton, ON
·Mountain Cable
| said by K Patterson :It is physically impossible to see a neighbor's upstream. The cable modem does not have a receiver that can be tuned to those frequencies. Not only that, the Port to Port isolation @ the Tap would severely degrade the signal before it would enter the neighbour's drop. |
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delusion FTL
@algx.net
| reply to K Patterson
I think the poster was more concerned about opening up the network in windows and seeing all his neighbors (and them seeing him). Rather than neighbors "sniffing" his traffic. This has been stopped by the cable modems no longer allowing in and out traffic over those ports that are used.
Broadcast packets can obviously still be captured. |
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K Patterson
Premium,MVM
join:2006-03-12
Columbus, OH | reply to Marcer
A good point! |
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