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I've prepared a little illustration to visualize my current situation:

current situation

  • I have no admin access to the router which provides the internet access (I can't change any of its settings)
  • Every time I connect a new device, which wasn't connected within the last 30 minutes, I have to login via a hotspot login mask with my credentials
  • The login is restricted to 2 simultaneous used devices
  • For a new device to gain access to the internet I have to manually log out a connected device via the hotspot auth mask
  • Smart devices and similar are never able to connect to the internet because they don't have an interface open the hotspot mask for me to enter my credentials
  • All connected devices are visible to each other in the network (e.g. entering 192.168.1.104 on my phone opens the localhost server of my computer)
  • The devices are connected via an Ethernet cable and/or a WiFi connection

Another illustrations shows one for my desired setup idea:

desired setup

  • I add some kind of a proxy-device between the main router and my devices
  • This device acts as an access point and logs in into the main router with my credentials through the hotspot login mask
  • It creates its own dedicated sub-network and distributes new IP addresses to all of my devices

Results:

  • Smart accessories can access the internet now
  • No extra login is required
  • The 30-minute timeout for the login won't affect me anymore, since the newly added device is constantly logged in
  • The two-device limit is bypassed, since the proxy-device is only one device

Questions:

  • Is this kind of setup possible in general? (without having access to the settings interface of the main router)
  • Which device(s) do I need for this to work?
Felix Bernhard
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  • Who controls the AP? Are you trying to circumvent some security implementations? – Lenniey Jan 28 '20 at 16:24
  • @Lenniey My landlord controls it and is reluctant to change it, not because of security measures but because "it worked like this for everyone the last 10 years, why should I change it now" – Felix Bernhard Jan 28 '20 at 16:45

1 Answers1

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This is all in theory since it depends how the wifi-hotspot manufacturer works:

1) set up a Wifi-ethernet bridge using a Ras Pi https://pimylifeup.com/raspberry-pi-wifi-bridge/ This would connect to the wi-fi hotspot router as a static device. A troubleshooting pain point would be validating that the client authentication pop up works as expected.

(you can also use an old macbook, they had support for this in the 00's and it was pretty clean. ) 2) Have that wifi-> ethernet bridge connect to a wireless access point that you have made and have your devices connect to that. Basically your device from step 1 is a pseudo-modem/gateway and you would configure a Wifi devices locally for your devices to connect.

This all would have to be tested of course and things could still go dorksville. You can test cost-efficienty with the ras pi first.

Best of luck!

Max Humphrey
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