Hacking

I have spoken to countless Verizon agents about my router being hacked, no matter how many times I update my account and change my password. There is always a new IP address connected to the router. The app does not notify me that it is connected to a new device and it does not even give me the location of the device that has been recently connected so then what is the purpose of having that feature ? and it continues going on and on. I have multiple blocked IP addresses on my account that have gained unauthorized access to my router. agents have removed these IP addresses before and they simply return. I know for a fact, this is a hacking issue and I have a problem with it because I was assured and reassured by an agent that since I have the premium plan for high-speed Internet that my devices and my account would be safe, but it turns out that they are not, I pay too much money for this specific service and it does not work. I have not received a response from Verizon. Agents are gaslighting me and giving me the runaround that I need to contact tech-support tech-support has not responded. They have not solved my issue and have continued to gaslight me. I want answers and I am seriously considering changing services because I’ve been going through this for years and nothing and I am an absolutely nothing has been done to solve this issue

Accepted answers

smith6612

Something along those lines, yes. The IP addresses devices hold even inside of your network can change from day to day. Now, while you might be able to keep your IPv4 addresses the same (such as 192.168.1.100) through address reservation in the router, your IPv4 WAN IP address can change without notice. Should happen sparingly since you leave the router on all the time, but it can happen during maintenance periods overnight (should also be infrequent). For addresses internal to your network, the router only knows how to re-assign them back based on the MAC (Hardware) address of a device. Same goes for identifying devices in the network map. If a computer or phone changes the MAC address on a regular basis as part of a privacy feature, then it will appear like a new device on the router, and the old device will just become a dormant entry in the router. This sort of thing comes enabled as standard on many phones now.

IPv6 is completely different. Many devices with IPv6 addresses will change their addresses on a daily basis, and this is because of something known as IPv6 Privacy Extensions. It is working as intended, since IPv6 provides each device with a publicly reachable address on the Internet. It's also not easy to provide IPv6 address reservations, because most ISPs do not guarantee that you will have the same IPv6 address block on a day to day basis, either.

Now, since you're in an apartment building, the thing to watch out for is your physical wiring, especially with Coax/MoCA connections to the router. Ethernet will be less of an issue especially if you know where each Ethernet connection actually goes to. It can be common in older apartment buildings for the Coaxial cables for one unit to tie into another unit due to legacy Cable TV / Community Antenna setups, and with that comes the opportunity for unknown devices to start appearing on your router, if another one of your building's tenants happens to use MoCA as well. The Verizon router will show these devices as connecting in via MoCA, not Wi-Fi, while they are connected. If you/your apartment's management are 100% sure that all of the Coax connections inside of your unit, including the one to your router, only serve your unit, then this is unlikely to be a problem. Newer complexes typically bring all Coax and Ethernet connections to a media cabinet in your unit, where ISPs like Verizon and your local Cable company will connect up to you.

All comments

Capricorn1

I'm confused about what you're updating and what your expectations are. You didn't mention it, but I assume you are using a Verizon router.

If you change your account username and password in the My Verizon app, it only updates the login for your Verizon account. That's where you can view your billing and plan information, for example. Changing that login has no effect on the login for the wired or wireless networks of your router.

Perhaps you meant that you are changing the router password and/or the wireless network name (SSID) and password. If you haven't changed those, I would recommend it. The defaults are printed on the router, so they should be considered insecure. If someone surreptitiously takes a picture of that label, they could gain access to your network if those have not been changed.

What can you tell us about the device that is connecting? IP address? (Is it always the same address?) The MAC address? Can you get screenshots from the router's connected devices page? (Varies based on the model of the router you have.) I assume the device is connecting wirelessly. If so, it has to be pretty close by.

Lesmorg92

Hi, thanks for your reply. I have changed router names , and passwords repeatedly turned of wfs and even removed the saving of passwords and settings of devices to the Verizon storage cloud. Recently yesterday I spent the entire day restarting router and cleaning passwords to all c connections there were about 45+ devices connected and offline combined that i removed weeks ago. Even updated security questions, activated face id for iPhone and added pin, with in the next hour they were back in with a different ip address. I have screenshots and screen recording of the MAC Addresses and IPv4 addresses provided by the Home app. The screen recording took about 25 minutes to remove devices. Agents I’ve spoken to have only told me that I have the best plan but this doesn’t appear to do reflect that. Respectfully.

smith6612

I'm not sure what the problem is. Are you in an apartment complex or a single family home?

If you've changed your Verizon passwords and you've customized the WiFi Password from what is printed on the side of the router, there should be nothing to worry about. Your router issues out IPs dynamically, and many modern devices (phones, notably) use MAC Address Randomization in order to protect from networks that track based on MAC Address. Every time the MAC address changes, you're going to get a new IP address, and likewise every time you forget and re-add a network on a device using Randomized MAC addresses, you will get a new MAC address.

If you're looking at the Firewall logs in the router, just note that much of that is generally noise. The Internet is a very noisy place, and bots often times probe IP addresses for services they are hosting. If you're not using port forwarding, and you don't have UPnP enabled in your router, there is nothing for them to find, and the firewall is just doing the job it is supposed to do by dropping unsolicited traffic that will go nowhere, anyways.

DNS Rebinding log entries are similar. Many applications use DNS Rebinding (meaning the DNS Record points to an Internal or Private IP address) as a form of self connectivity checking, and also for self communication. This is a way of working around problems on devices with loopback communication. In other cases it is a way to point connections to your local network on applications which connect to the cloud - since after all, there is no point brokering a connection to the Cloud if it's just going right back to your network.

Also, note that Verizon uses Dynamic IP addresses on Residential Internet. If you are powering down or disconnecting your router for more than say, an hour, someone else on the Verizon network is free to take your old IP Address. Every time you get a new IP address, it is by design. You need to continue using the IP on a consistent basis in order to hold that IP address. Additionally, IP Address geolocation is purely an estimated guess. The only way to keep that as accurate as possible, is to leave your router powered on and connected.

Lesmorg92

I have never powered off the router, its remains on unless there I’m advised by cs to do a hard reset. Location of the router is in an apartment complex. I intentionally remove all devices to add them back on in order weed out any devices. what I gathered from your explanation is that the router is saving a rotated ip address that I may or may not have set up on a device? Is this what you mean?

smith6612