Let’s say, I sit down in a mall, open my laptop and connect to a secured mobile hotspot. Then I do it again next week after a reboot. What information would a nearby shop or a passive malicious hacker be able to find about my device? Does my device send out identifying information before joining, like a MAC address? Is this persistent, or randomized?
I intentionally haven’t specified a distro, so if something only applies to some network managers, give some details.
Bonus points: what about Android phones?
This is actually an Android feature. iOS, too. It’ll give a random MAC or device MAC depending on what you want.
My MDM at work for Android-based handhelds I’ve configured to device MAC so I can geofence devices and keep track of them. If an employee connects to the employee network (which has to be configured by IT) we set it up with with device only MAC so we can add that device to the allowed list. Apple warns “it enables tracking” but if they ask I tell them in public it might be configured that way but we don’t care nor monitor that closely. If someone shares out the WiFi password by digging through settings, it wouldn’t matter as it’s not allowed.
Anyway, just thought I’d share both mainstream OSes do this now for a few years now.