WiFi - hidden/non-broadcasting SSID's

[pkopalek]

This is something that has been addressed with other handsets, and other users, sometimes with success, and sometimes without.

My friend has solved this problem with his HTC Hero.

You're trying to connect to a WiFi network that is hidden. In other words, the name isn't broadcasted. In other words (again), your WiFi won't automatically find this network.

OK. So you manually type it in Menu > Settings > Wireless Ctrl > WiFi Settings > Add Wi-Fi network. You type in all of the details.

No connection. As if it's not there.

So you find that some others with their Android phones, have found success using HiddenSSIDEnabler from the Market.

Removing the 'Remembered' network. Adding it freshly. Using HiddenSSID.... Removing it again. Adding it again. In any order. No luck.

I've tried, with several different networks, with no success.

Has anyone had success connecting to Hidden networks on their Eris? I am curious to know if others have, even with the same methods, been able to, as I have not. My iPhone friends laugh at me!

http://androidforums.com/android-ap...ecting-non-broadcasting-wireless-network.html

 

[xene97]

Fortunately my phone has no problem connecting to my hidden wireless (WPA2, AES). I went to Settings>Wireless Controls>Wi-Fi Settings>Add Wi-Fi network. The way I finally got it to work is by entering the SSID and then scrolling down and entering the Security settings & key. The first time I didn't realize that there were more entries other than the SSID and just hit the Save button. Haven't had any problems since.

 

[pkopalek]

Does this mean that everyone else is having success with this?

I'm baffled!

 

[doogald]

I'm curious: why are you hiding the SSID in the first place? Is it because you have some device that doesn't support anything stronger than WEP?

If not, you are far, far better off turning off hiding, using WPA2 with AES (or at least WPA, which will use TKIP).

(As you can tell, I don't hide SSIDs, so I have no idea whether an Eris works with them or not.)

 

[pkopalek]

It's not my network. It's a network within my network in my office at work. It's private so that just our department has access to it.

If it were my own network, I wouldn't hide it.

 

[davidwanat]

Any word on this? I also have a work network that does not broadcast the SSID. I too have tried the hero fix w/ HiddenSSIDenabler, and also tried WiFinder with no luck.

 

[graphitedv]

I have noticed that the Eris does not play nice with WPA Enterprise...

 

[davidwanat]

The network I'm having trouble with is WPA2 Personal the password is... wait a second.

Still frustrated, looks like I'm not getting anything done at work today

 

[bjanow]

I have noticed that the Eris does not play nice with WPA Enterprise...

Interesting. I have it set up with WPA Personal and it's just fine. If you are the admin, can you change it for a short time?

 

[pkopalek]

On my third Eris, it sure seems like, just speaking for plain old WPA, that if you get the network name and password JUST RIGHT, it connects. Capitalization and everything.

Other types of hidden networks I have no good experience with, if it's not an Open network.

 

[dg370]

I have the same problem. I can connect at work to a hidden WPA2 personal. I can't connect at home unless I broadcast the SSID. Devices that can connect at home without broadcast include Nintendo Wii, Ipod, several PCs with different wireless adapters. It's probably a OS issue/limitation. The Linux world has struggled for years with wireless issues. Very frustrating.

 

[deno73]

No problem here at home connecting to hidden router. wep, wpa security is not on just the hidden ssid

Router: D-Link 1023

 

[gmbyrom]

I've just been doing some testing... I have both an HTC Hero and a Legend. My network normally broadcasts the SSID, but I've turned it off for this test.

On the Hero:

Network is "remembered" already. Turn off SSID broadcast, phone disconnects from network but reconnects again within about 30 seconds.

On the Legend:

Network is "remembered" already as before, but with the SSID broadcast off, it will NOT connect to the network. I HAVE TO broadcast the SSID to get this phone to work with my WiFi.

On both counts: why?

 

[erisuser1]

Thought I would add a "mixed success" report to this thread - my Eris seems to play nice with a WiFi router sending no beacons (SSID broadcast supressed) ... using specific configurations

Tested Configuration(s):

Router: Linksys WRT54G, firmware v1.02.7 build 011 (Jul 27, 2009)
Eris: 2.1 rooted ROM (ivanmj's "Official 0.6T" ROM)

#1) B+G, WPA-PSK + TKIP : worked *
#2) B+G, WPA2-PSK + AES : strange behavior
#3) G only, WPA2-PSK + AES: worked

In the two cases above which just "worked" (flawlessly), I tested by "forgetting" the network, and manually entering settings (SSID, Encryption, Password); if that succeeded, I would turn off WiFi, re-boot the phone, and then re-enable WiFi to see if the connection would come up automatically. I also performed the "forget network", turned off WiFi, rebooted the phone, turned on WiFi, and entered the WiFi settings manually to see if that made any difference. In the two working cases above (#1 and #3), it did not appear to change the behavior.

Setup #2 acted rather strangely: after turning on WiFi and manually entering the setup (SSID, Encryption, Password), the Eris would suddenly start "seeing" two different networks with the same SSID, claiming that one was encrypted with WEP, and the other with WPA/WPA2 PSK. It would attempt to connect to one of them (saying "obtaining address"), but that would fail, and it would continuously loop in that fashion.

Discussion
None of this really surprises me, frankly - I've dealt with a fair number of WiFi devices over the years, and it is not uncommon to see bugs between a one client and an AP... when a different wireless client from a different vendor, or (even the same vendor) with a different firmware release will not display the same bug.

I know that's not the way we would hope the world works, but the various 802.11a/b/g/n specifications are quite complex (compared to say wired ethernet networking) - and that creates plentiful opportunities for software bugs. Note how strange the above report is: all three configurations work correctly when beacons are used (that is, the SSID is not "hidden") - but mysteriously, only some combinations of apparently-unrelated settings work when beacons are turned off.

If there is a moral to this story, it is that you will probably need to fool around with your router's settings if it doesn't work correctly with the Eris; if you don't have control of the router, then you are a mostly out of luck, since there are few "knobs to turn" on the Eris.


eu1


* Note that use of WPA+TKIP is deprecated - it shares many of the same weaknesses that allows WEP to be easily cracked. If you are able to use WPA2+AES, that should be your preferred choice.

 

[doogald]

* Note that use of WPA+TKIP is deprecated - it shares many of the same weaknesses that allows WEP to be easily cracked. If you are able to use WPA2+AES, that should be your preferred choice.

Just to add to this, if anybody must use WPA with TKIP, you can take care of any possible exploits at this time by setting the WPA group key timeout to a low number of minutes; 10 minutes (or 600 seconds, if it is counted that way) should be low enough. You can go lower, but there is probably little need to.

As far as I know, the crackability of this is limited only to routers with Quality of Service (QoS) turned on, and what the cracker can do is very, very limited, at least right now. They will not be able to read any data from your network, for example, But the assumption should be that at some point very clever people will be able to do clever, not so nice things with this.