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   Ryan Clough :scremcat: (ciscojunkie@techhub.social)'s status on Friday, 24-Jul-2026 02:04:22 JST Ryan Clough :scremcat:

   Heh, my hotel's guest network conflicts with some of the internal security tools on my work laptop. Ultimately, this meant captive portal was completely broken because it would try to redirect to an internally-used IP on my machine.

   My fix? Clone my work laptop's MAC to my personal laptop, accept the captive portal there, and then revert the cloning. Annoying, but my work laptop can now connect directly to the hotel's network instead of me needing to put my phone in the middle as a wireless hotspot. 🤦

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     Ryan Castellucci (they/them) :nonbinary_flag: (ryanc@infosec.exchange)'s status on Friday, 24-Jul-2026 02:04:21 JST Ryan Castellucci (they/them) :nonbinary_flag:

     in reply to

     @CiscoJunkie There's now a standardized DHCP option to indicate the captive portal login URL, and browsers/OSs have explicit detection, so it's not as painful as it used to be.

     On the other hand, the old "hook port 80 and 302" stuff doesn't work any more because ~everything is TLS.

     I haven't run into a broken one for a while, tbh.

     If one asks me for my email address or any other information, though, they're getting Some Bullshit.

   • Embed this notice
     Ryan Clough :scremcat: (ciscojunkie@techhub.social)'s status on Friday, 24-Jul-2026 02:04:22 JST Ryan Clough :scremcat:

     in reply to

     But for the #network admins out there, I'm curious: What's your take on captive portals for guest wireless in this day and age?

     Personally, I've seen it cause a large number of end-user complaints a majority of the time it's implemented. I'd also question the legal efficacy, especially when a lot of companies are blindly throwing in a generic/default use agreement. I feel like I haven't seen as many guest networks leaning on captive portal as I used to.

     Then again, I've been outside of most "enterprise networking" until last year, so I'd love to hear from folks who have been immersed in that area longer.