[Discuss] Wireguard and Traveling and Network Overlaps oh my!

[Kent Borg]

On 11/2/24 9:31 AM, Rich Pieri wrote:
> I bought a GL.iNet travel router. Pocket-sized device, USB-C power (15W),
> runs OpenWRT, bridges to existing WiFi networks (repeater mode).

The "runs OpenWRT" part caught my eye!

I like OpenWrt but am annoyed that with the zillions of routers out 
there, I can buy one that can run OpenWRT great but a year later see it 
no longer supported.

But the GL people seem to ship OpenWRT on all their hardware. That 
suggests that there will be longer support for this hardware.


Looking about further I see a "GL.iNet GL-E750V2 (MUDI) 4G LTE Portable 
Wi-Fi Hotspot". Very interesting, too. There are two hacks that 
apparently make it very valuable:

  - IMEI can be set, If it matches that of the phone my provider knows 
about…it looks to my provider like my phone.

  - The TTL on packets can be set to 65. This is what phones set for 
their own traffic (as opposed to router hotspot traffic), making all of 
the client traffic look like traffic for the phone itself.

I suppose there is a cat-and-mouse game in these things, but because it 
is a bit techie to do the two hacks (type an "AT" command in the GUI, 
type an "iptables" command on a command line or in a script), there 
aren't going to be done by millions of customers. So if I don't abuse it 
*too* much, making me not worth tracking down specifically, it is 
probably a durable thing.

Not that I go anywhere at the moment…but I have hope that will change, 
and if it does, being able to freely use my notebook on the internets 
when merely in slightly civilized areas of the country would be very nice.


-kb