Netgate Discussion Forum
    • Categories
    • Recent
    • Tags
    • Popular
    • Users
    • Search
    • Register
    • Login

    Request for dhcp from strange address?

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved DHCP and DNS
    39 Posts 6 Posters 5.8k Views
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as topic
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with topic management privileges can see it.
    • JKnottJ Offline
      JKnott
      last edited by

      Area 51 is in Nevada ;)  Groom Lake!

      From the article "[Dugway is] the new Area 51. And probably the new military spaceport.".  ;)

      Or what is more likely is they are using IPs that are not theirs because they don't think anyone will be talking to those IPs..

      My cell carrier did that prior to switching over to IPv6.  I'd get an address in the 25 block, IIRC, which NATed to the 24 block.  Now my phone is IPv6 only and uses 464XLAT to provide IPv4 access.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPv6_transition_mechanism#464XLAT

      PfSense running on Qotom mini PC
      i5 CPU, 4 GB memory, 32 GB SSD & 4 Intel 1 Gb Ethernet ports.
      UniFi AC-Lite access point

      I haven't lost my mind. It's around here...somewhere...

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • johnpozJ Offline
        johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
        last edited by

        Oh you meant R-6413 ;)  Yeah that is in Utah…

        An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
        If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
        Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
        SG-4860 25.07.1 | Lab VMs 2.8.1, 25.07.1

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • J Offline
          JonH
          last edited by

          @johnpoz:

          Yeah ARIN is pretty up to date.. Not sure they would have a wrong listing for 30 address..  Are you saying you got your dhcp IP from this IP address??  I am confused on what this address has to do with anything to be honest?  Or what does it matter?  Maybe the dod uses your same ISP??  And they are running multiple layer 3 networks on the same layer 2 ;)

          I'm confused too, that is why I posted here looking for suggestions.  My logs have wrapped around since I started this so I don't have documentation now.

          This is a typical entry from dhcp log.  I do note the acknowledging server is from a different IP than yesterday but this IP is registered to my ISP, which is the cable company Charter Communications.  My connection is via cable modem.

          Nov 21 04:07:42 	dhclient 	27954 	DHCPREQUEST on igb0 to 68.114.36.9 port 67
          Nov 21 04:07:42 	dhclient 	27954 	DHCPACK from 68.114.36.9
          Nov 21 04:07:42 	dhclient 		RENEW
          Nov 21 04:07:42 	dhclient 		Creating resolv.conf
          Nov 21 04:07:42 	dhclient 	27954 	bound to x.x.x.x -- renewal in 12752 seconds.
          Nov 21 04:41:30 	dhcpd 		Wrote 0 deleted host decls to leases file.
          Nov 21 04:41:30 	dhcpd 		Wrote 0 new dynamic host decls to leases file.
          Nov 21 04:41:30 	dhcpd 		Wrote 16 leases to leases file. 
          

          What that looks like is a dhcpack.. So your saying that is what is giving you your IP??  Then either your ISP is the DOD ;)  Or what is more likely is they are using IPs that are not theirs because they don't think anyone will be talking to those IPs..  While its BAD practice, it is common practice..  Again its BAD practice.. but happens more than you think.. Companies to lazy to do proper IPAM or subnetting or natting when required..  Hey lets grab these /8's that are owned by DOD - nobody is going to be going there ;)

          Or for the really paranoid, it's the NSC's backdoor into a large US customer base.

          I cannot say that 30.85.128.1 is giving me my IP.  For the last month or so I've noticed everytime my lease was renewed there is a message in the log that there are 2 dhcp servers.  That is news to me.  But now that I have found this DoD server maybe that is the cause of that message.

          I can only say that this IP is in my firewall log.  My dhcp log shows my request being ack by Charter's IP.  I first discovered this when I did a halt on pfSense so I could relocate the SG2440.  I then looked at the logs after restarting, I had never done a cold startup since putting it into service.  I found that odd IP in the firewall log about the same point in time that my DHCP request was being ACK.  I didn't recognize it and did a whois.  That started this thread.  I blocked that IP and it continued to hammer 2x every 10 minutes throughout the night.  I recently unblocked that rule.

          Now that I've been through this discussion and looked at the logs for awhile, I'd have to repeat that cold startup and capture the logs to review.  I think it's pretty crazy.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • JKnottJ Offline
            JKnott
            last edited by

            Hey lets grab these /8's that are owned by DOD - nobody is going to be going there

            Except aliens.  ;)

            PfSense running on Qotom mini PC
            i5 CPU, 4 GB memory, 32 GB SSD & 4 Intel 1 Gb Ethernet ports.
            UniFi AC-Lite access point

            I haven't lost my mind. It's around here...somewhere...

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • johnpozJ Offline
              johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
              last edited by

              I don't see how its crazy.. Since this is broadcast traffic and can only be on layer 2, which is your ISP.. Contact your ISP if your curious/concerned.  But going to say this yet again.  Just because the IP is registered to the DOD doesn't mean its not your ISP using it, or could just be some idiot down the street running a dhcp server on his wan and he is using dod address space..

              An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
              If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
              Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
              SG-4860 25.07.1 | Lab VMs 2.8.1, 25.07.1

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • D Offline
                doktornotor Banned
                last edited by

                @johnpoz:

                could just be some idiot down the street running a dhcp server on his wan and he is using dod address space..

                One, two, three of them just here on the forum…

                ;D ;D ;D

                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • johnpozJ Offline
                  johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                  last edited by

                  ^ heheh exactly!!!  So see if they plugged that interface into their isp device the wrong way.. Big Bang Zoom there you go a dod address space dhcp server on some ISP layer 2 network.  Where all the users on that network could see the traffic..  Hopefully they don't get an IP from it ;)  You would HOPE!!!! That the isp is running stuff to prevent unauthorized dhcp servers on the layer 2 between them and their customers.  But you never know….

                  So what I would do is email your isp support, showing them dhcp traffic and the IP and asking if that is them...  Or one of their other idiot users..

                  Whats the mac address coming from that 30 address?  We can look it up and see what kind of hardware it is, or the maker of it..

                  An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                  If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                  Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                  SG-4860 25.07.1 | Lab VMs 2.8.1, 25.07.1

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • J Offline
                    JonH
                    last edited by

                    @johnpoz:

                    Whats the mac address coming from that 30 address?  We can look it up and see what kind of hardware it is, or the maker of it..

                    So I would need to have a packet trace running at the moment in time that the misconfigured device makes a request?  Or is there another way that I am not thinking about?

                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • K Offline
                      kpa
                      last edited by

                      ARP table, it's there exactly for the purpose of seeing the MAC addresses of network peers on the same network segment.

                      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • JKnottJ Offline
                        JKnott
                        last edited by

                        ^^^^
                        An arp cache has a limited lifetime, so he'd have to check it within a short period of time.  However, if he can ping that address and get a response, the arp cache would have the MAC.  Failing that, just let the packet capture run, filtering on that IP address.

                        PfSense running on Qotom mini PC
                        i5 CPU, 4 GB memory, 32 GB SSD & 4 Intel 1 Gb Ethernet ports.
                        UniFi AC-Lite access point

                        I haven't lost my mind. It's around here...somewhere...

                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • J Offline
                          JonH
                          last edited by

                          The IP does not respond to a ping.  But my ISP's dhcp does respond to a ping.

                          I think the only option is a packet capture.  Not sure I want to leave it running for an extended period of time.

                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • chpalmerC Offline
                            chpalmer
                            last edited by

                            @johnpoz:

                            ^ heheh exactly!!!

                            +1

                            Had a large fire agency in my county trying to hand out DHCP to cable system customers for almost two weeks till the techs paid them a visit.  ;D ::)

                            Triggering snowflakes one by one..
                            Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4590T CPU @ 2.00GHz on an M400 WG box.

                            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • K Offline
                              kpa
                              last edited by

                              At least my ISP is sneaky enough to isolate its clients from each other:

                              
                              $ ifconfig em1
                              em1: flags=8843 <up,broadcast,running,simplex,multicast>metric 0 mtu 1500
                                      options=209b <rxcsum,txcsum,vlan_mtu,vlan_hwtagging,vlan_hwcsum,wol_magic>ether 00:1b:21:14:ca:5e
                                      inet6 fe80::21b:21ff:fe14:ca5e%em1 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x3
                                      inet 88.xxx.yyy.181 netmask 0xffffe000 broadcast 88.xxx.zzz.255
                                      inet 192.168.1.200 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.168.1.255
                                      nd6 options=21 <performnud,auto_linklocal>media: Ethernet autoselect (100baseTX <full-duplex>)
                                      status: active
                              
                              $ ping 88.xxx.yyy.182
                              PING 88.xxx.yyy.182 (88.xxx.yyy.182): 56 data bytes
                              ^C
                              --- 88.xxx.yyy.182 ping statistics ---
                              1 packets transmitted, 0 packets received, 100.0% packet loss
                              
                              $ arp -an
                              ...
                              ? (88.xxx.yyy.182) at 00:0b:45:b6:ef:c0 on em1 expires in 1058 seconds [ethernet]
                              ? (88.xxx.yyy.181) at 00:1b:21:14:ca:5e on em1 permanent [ethernet]
                              ? (88.xxx.yyy.1) at 00:0b:45:b6:ef:c0 on em1 expires in 90 seconds [ethernet]
                              ...</full-duplex></performnud,auto_linklocal></rxcsum,txcsum,vlan_mtu,vlan_hwtagging,vlan_hwcsum,wol_magic></up,broadcast,running,simplex,multicast> 
                              

                              The .181 is my current IP address and the .1 address is the gateway on the WAN network and it (or more likely some equipment between me and the gateway device) seems to just proxy ARP every single IP address of the WAN network that is not assigned to you.

                              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                              • JKnottJ Offline
                                JKnott
                                last edited by

                                ^^^^
                                Are you on a cable modem?  I am and can see the arp requests for others, including on other subnets.  However, I can't see any traffic from the others, as cable modems have separate channels for each direction.

                                PfSense running on Qotom mini PC
                                i5 CPU, 4 GB memory, 32 GB SSD & 4 Intel 1 Gb Ethernet ports.
                                UniFi AC-Lite access point

                                I haven't lost my mind. It's around here...somewhere...

                                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                • chpalmerC Offline
                                  chpalmer
                                  last edited by

                                  @JKnott:

                                  ^^^^
                                  Are you on a cable modem?  I am and can see the arp requests for others, including on other subnets.  However, I can't see any traffic from the others, as cable modems have separate channels for each direction.

                                  I can see every one of the cable modems via their local maintenance IP address on my system.

                                  The reason you don't see their traffic is because the system acts like a switch and not a hub. They do block network shares however.

                                  Triggering snowflakes one by one..
                                  Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4590T CPU @ 2.00GHz on an M400 WG box.

                                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                  • K Offline
                                    kpa
                                    last edited by

                                    I'm on (A)DSL of a type that encapsulates ethernet frames into ATM, no PPPo(E|A). This type of connection would normally allow client to client traffic because it's just standard ethernet by all means, I've seen it working on a similar ADSL connection from my previous ISP many years ago but my current one (Sonera) seems to have other ideas.

                                    Oh and of course we are only talking about layer 2 isolation here to disable broadcast based services such as DHCP, IP level connections such as SSH will still get trough.

                                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                    • J Offline
                                      JonH
                                      last edited by

                                      @JKnott:

                                      ^^^^
                                      Are you on a cable modem?  I am and can see the arp requests for others, including on other subnets.  However, I can't see any traffic from the others, as cable modems have separate channels for each direction.

                                      Yes, cable modem.  I do not see anything beyond my gateway.  Since I am using an SG2440 I cannot start a packet trace in time to catch it.  I'll keep watching for it, last week I had it blocked by a rule and it kept trying ever so often for hours.  Today, I had it unblocked, trying to catch it's MAC and it only hit a few times.

                                      I'm now thinking that I'll shutdown & restart while that IP is blocked, start packet trace, then disable the rule and see it it hits me.

                                      
                                      Shell Output - arp -an
                                      
                                      ? (192.168.1.41) at 10:bf:48:x:x:x on igb1 expires in 586 seconds [ethernet]
                                      ? (192.168.1.8) at 90:b1:1c:x:x:x on igb1 expires in 1061 seconds [ethernet]
                                      ? (192.168.1.43) at 78:31:c1:x:x:x on igb1 expires in 584 seconds [ethernet]
                                      ? (192.168.1.107) at 70:48:0f:x:x:x on igb1 expires in 1196 seconds [ethernet]
                                      ? (192.168.1.10) at e0:3f:49:x:x:x on igb1 expires in 755 seconds [ethernet]
                                      ? (192.168.1.109) at 00:11:d9:x:x:x on igb1 expires in 1000 seconds [ethernet]
                                      ? (192.168.1.1) at 00:08:a2:x:x:x on igb1 permanent [ethernet]               <---- LAN IP
                                      ? (192.168.1.125) at 70:14:a6:x:x:x on igb1 expires in 1187 seconds [ethernet]
                                      ? (192.168.1.30) at 00:1c:2a:x:x:x on igb1 expires in 614 seconds [ethernet]
                                      ? (192.168.1.126) at 48:e9:f1:x:x:x on igb1 expires in 1169 seconds [ethernet]
                                      ? (192.168.1.20) at c0:56:e3:x:x:x on igb1 expires in 1178 seconds [ethernet]
                                      ? (192.168.1.151) at 00:11:d9:x:x:x on igb1 expires in 1187 seconds [ethernet]
                                      ? (96.38.x.x) at 00:01:5c:x:x:x on igb0 expires in 884 seconds [ethernet]    <---upstream gateway
                                      ? (96.38.x.x) at 00:08:a2:x:x:x on igb0 permanent [ethernet]                     <--- WAN IP
                                      
                                      

                                      I don't know how many users are on my subnet, I know that I'm the last drop on the line. 
                                      I'm locked out of the cable modem, I can only see the up/down SNR & power level.
                                      Also, it may be worth noting the the cable modem is at the standard 192.168.100.1 and will toss out a dhcpack when the upstream sync is lost.  I have that IP blocked.

                                      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                      • JKnottJ Offline
                                        JKnott
                                        last edited by

                                        I don't understand your problem with using packet capture.  Just configure it to capture only that IP address and let it run as long as it takes.  It won't hurt anything.  The hardware shouldn't make any difference for this.  I run pfSense on a refurb computer.

                                        I just fired up the packet capture for a few seconds and caught this:

                                        09:15:43.648284 ARP, Request who-has 45.2.75.30 tell 45.2.75.1, length 46
                                        09:15:43.675278 ARP, Request who-has 216.58.58.117 tell 216.58.58.97, length 46
                                        09:15:43.764767 ARP, Request who-has 45.2.73.243 tell 45.2.73.129, length 46
                                        09:15:43.810850 ARP, Request who-has 99.250.252.189 tell 99.250.240.1, length 46
                                        09:15:43.875635 ARP, Request who-has 216.181.152.74 tell 216.181.152.1, length 46

                                        Once you've captured the traffic, you can download it and open the file with Wireshark, to better examine it, including reading the MAC address.  Or you can just increase the detail level to display the full capture, including MAC addresses.

                                        Incidentally, my preferred way to capture network traffic is with Wireshark, but since pfSense won't run it, I bought a small managed switch, which I configured for port mirroring.  I then run Wireshark on my notebook computer, plugged into the monitoring port.

                                        BTW, notice all the different subnets in that capture.  My ISP has different subnets for customers and also carries traffic for a 3rd party ISP.  There is also their home phone service in there, but I don't know what subnet it's on.

                                        PfSense running on Qotom mini PC
                                        i5 CPU, 4 GB memory, 32 GB SSD & 4 Intel 1 Gb Ethernet ports.
                                        UniFi AC-Lite access point

                                        I haven't lost my mind. It's around here...somewhere...

                                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                        • J Offline
                                          JonH
                                          last edited by

                                          I guess I should have looked harder at the pfSense packet capture.  I haven't gotten to that part of the pfSense book yet so I did not realize I could filter to capture only certain packets.

                                          In other situations I've captured all and then filtered with wireshark after downloading.  Great capability that capture can be fine tuned like that.

                                          I'm using an unmanaged switch so no way to port mirror AFAIK.

                                          I'll play around with this and see if I have any luck.
                                          Thanks!!

                                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                          • JKnottJ Offline
                                            JKnott
                                            last edited by

                                            While the packet capture in pfSense is useful, I find Wireshark to be far more capable.  For example, it supports filtering on the MAC address, which I don't see in packet capture.  It also supports complex filters and has both capture and display filters.  In addition, you can watch the captures in real time.  For those reasons and more, I recently bought a cheap 5 port gigabit managed switch, so I could monitor in situations where Wireshark wouldn't be otherwise available.

                                            In your case, just set packet capture to filter on that IP address and let it run for a while.

                                            PfSense running on Qotom mini PC
                                            i5 CPU, 4 GB memory, 32 GB SSD & 4 Intel 1 Gb Ethernet ports.
                                            UniFi AC-Lite access point

                                            I haven't lost my mind. It's around here...somewhere...

                                            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                            • First post
                                              Last post
                                            Copyright 2025 Rubicon Communications LLC (Netgate). All rights reserved.