Hotel wired jack question
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We're using Pfsense in a hotel, most users use the wifi. We also have wired jacks in the rooms.
The other day we ran into a problem where the network went down. No service. Once we removed a switch from the network it all came up. The switch isolated from the room connections tested fine. It's a simple dumb switch.
We're thinking someone attached, innocently, a computer with a hard coded IP or a printer with a hard coded ip, same as the pfsense default gateway. I've seen this before in office environments.
what sort of measures can we take to prevent that?
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Maybe someone linked a LAN port to a Lan port causing STP issues or maybe they had a dhcp server on the device that they connected to the lan port.
Whatever you need to fix the issue it needs to be done on the switches not the router.
What shows in the switch logs oh its a dumb switch so I doubt its manageable.
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On the core switch where the jack connects to enable STP/RSTP and probably rate-limit outgoing ports to the rooms.
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Just make sure they can't just "choose" to be elected your spanning tree root or something stupid like that.
Are your wired and wireless networks on the same layer 2? You might consider separating them else someone who connects wired and wireless at the same time with something like an Airport express in "join a wireless network" mode will create a bridging loop. probably many ways to accomplish that with two ports to the same layer 2 in the same location. (one wireless, one wired).
You ought to be able to just use the same CP on both networks.
