Wireless Access

last person joined: 17 hours ago 

Access network design for branch, remote, outdoor, and campus locations with HPE Aruba Networking access points and mobility controllers.
Back to discussions
Expand all | Collapse all

Is skyhook the location provider Aruba access points use? Is there a way to bypass this?

This thread has been viewed 2 times

  • 1.  Is skyhook the location provider Aruba access points use? Is there a way to bypass this?

    Posted May 18, 2015 12:09 PM

    We use our Aruba AP's at technical conferences at different venues.  

    The issue... When clients attach to our wifi system, their location shows they are in the city of our last event.  So, an event in NYC, weeks later the system is brought up in Utah and devices attaching to the AP's show they are in NYC. 

    We see this on 105's, 135's, 225's, with or without a controller.

    However, we are currently seeing this now using a 3400 with ver 6.3.1.15

    Suggestions would be appreciated.


    #AP225


  • 2.  RE: Is skyhook the location provider Aruba access points use? Is there a way to bypass this?

    EMPLOYEE
    Posted May 18, 2015 12:34 PM
    I have seen similar things with demo equipment. My assumption is that many mobile devices use the MAC addresses of AP's that they see to determine the location. I know that Google does this. If you move the AP's, and probably the more AP's you move, the worse as more AP's will give more 'certainty' that you are at a specific location. I have seen myself moving from Dubai to Sunnyvale (US) and back in a few hours on a WIndows Phone. The lab equipment ran in our Sunnyvale labs for some time, and those AP's were mapped there.. as soon as my phone saw those AP's, it believed it was in Sunnyvale. I'm afraid that this is something location providers, like Google, should fix. However, maybe someone has a solution....


  • 3.  RE: Is skyhook the location provider Aruba access points use? Is there a way to bypass this?

    EMPLOYEE
    Posted May 18, 2015 12:44 PM

    Do you have advertise-location enabled in the WLAN SSID Profile? It is disabled by default.

     

    I have no idea how they get these GPS coordinates. But I would disable it, if it is enabled.



  • 4.  RE: Is skyhook the location provider Aruba access points use? Is there a way to bypass this?

    EMPLOYEE
    Posted May 18, 2015 05:43 PM
    @clstraw wrote:

    We use our Aruba AP's at technical conferences at different venues.  

    The issue... When clients attach to our wifi system, their location shows they are in the city of our last event.  So, an event in NYC, weeks later the system is brought up in Utah and devices attaching to the AP's show they are in NYC. 

    We see this on 105's, 135's, 225's, with or without a controller.

    However, we are currently seeing this now using a 3400 with ver 6.3.1.15

    Suggestions would be appreciated.

     http://www.zdnet.com/article/how-google-and-everyone-else-gets-wi-fi-location-data/

     

    Probably the only solution is on the client side to use only GPS satellites for location tracking:

    location.png

     

     EDIT:  There is a way to opt your networks out of this wifi collection, but it is not practical:  https://support.google.com/nexus/answer/1725632?hl=en

     



  • 5.  RE: Is skyhook the location provider Aruba access points use? Is there a way to bypass this?

    EMPLOYEE
    Posted May 19, 2015 02:58 AM
    I found some additional information: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wi-Fi_positioning_system That confirms: "The Wi-Fi hotspot database gets filled by correlating mobile device GPS location data with Wi-Fi hotspot MAC addresses" So as soon as phones with GPS get nearby to your event network, the AP gets mapped there.. some of those providers seem to have a manual opt-out possibilty (see the wikipedia link); but most require you to add _nomap to your SSID, which is very ugly and cumbersome. Having your clients turn off Wifi location seems not a good possibility either. What may work however is walking around before the event with a few devices that have GPS enabled and feed the database that way; also you will need to find the best apps running (or not running), and if you need to be connected to the wifi, yes/no, to get that data into all location providers. Probably running the Wigle app is a nice start.. Agree, this is a pain, however from what I have read until now, feeding the systems with your own data may seem the best option... If you found what works, please post an update so others can benefit from that information.


  • 6.  RE: Is skyhook the location provider Aruba access points use? Is there a way to bypass this?

    Posted May 19, 2015 10:00 AM

    Thanks for the suggestions.  We did opt out of those providers we could.  

    We are still looking for a solution for our current situation but feeding the database will be tried in the future.