Change your Network Card MAC Address on Ubuntu

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Media Access Control address, a hardware address that uniquely identifies each node of a network. In IEEE 802 networks, the Data Link Control (DLC) layer of the OSI Reference Model is divided into two sublayers: the Logical Link Control (LLC) layer and the Media Access Control (MAC) layer. The MAC layer interfaces directly with the network medium.Consequently, each different type of network medium requires a different MAC layer. On networks that do not conform to the IEEE 802 standards but do conform to the OSI Reference Model, the node address is called the Data Link Control (DLC) address.

If you want to change your network card mac address you need to use simple utility called mac changer.MAC changer is a utility for manipulating the MAC address of network interfaces

Possible usages

You're in a DHCP network with some kind of IP-based restriction

You've a cluster that boot with BOOTP and you want to have a clean set of MACs

Debug MAC based routes

MAC Changer Features

Set specific MAC address of a network interface

Set the MAC randomly

Set a MAC of another vendor

Set another MAC of the same vendor

Set a MAC of the same kind (eg: wireless card)

Display a vendor MAC list (today, 6800 items) to choose from

Install MAC Changer in Ubuntusudo apt-get install macchanger

This will complete the installation.

If you Find your MAC address using the following command

ifconfig

eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:0C:29:A8:D0:FA
inet addr:172.20.22.35 Bcast:172.20.22.255 Mask:255.255.255.0
inet6 addr: fe80::20c:29ff:fea8:d0fa/64 Scope:Link
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:7690 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:6399 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:4284579 (4.0 MiB) TX bytes:876317 (855.7 KiB)
Interrupt:177 Base address:0x1080

In the above example MAC Address is 00:0C:29:A8:D0:FA

If you want to configure MAC Changer you need to stop the networking services using the following command

For Ubuntu Userssudo /etc/init.d/networking stop

Now you need to configure your MAC address using the following examples

MAC Changer Syntax

macchanger [options] device

Examples

macchanger eth1

Current MAC: 00:09:a5:eb:23:f7 (Hansung Eletronic Industries Development Co., Ltd)
Faked MAC: 00:09:a5:eb:23:f8 (Hansung Eletronic Industries Development Co., Ltd)

macchanger --endding eth1

Current MAC: 00:09:a5:eb:23:f8 (Hansung Eletronic Industries Development Co., Ltd)
Faked MAC: 00:09:a5:6f:31:23 (Hansung Eletronic Industries Development Co., Ltd)

macchanger --another eth1

Current MAC: 00:09:a5:6f:31:23 (Hansung Eletronic Industries Development Co., Ltd)
Faked MAC: 00:11:18:5b:3a:1f (Blx Ic Design Corp., Ltd.)

macchanger -A eth1

Current MAC: 00:06:5b:f6:f3:48 (Dell Computer Corp.)
Faked MAC: 00:0d:11:93:0c:4f (Dentsply -- Gendex)

macchanger -r eth1

Current MAC: 00:0d:11:93:0c:4f (Dentsply -- Gendex)
Faked MAC: 3c:f1:89:f9:1f:ce (unknown)

macchanger --mac=01:23:45:67:89:AB eth1

Current MAC: 00:40:96:43:87:65 [wireless] (Cisco/Aironet 4800/340)
Faked MAC: 01:23:45:67:89:ab (unknown)

./macchanger --list=Cray

Misc MACs:
Num MAC Vendor
--- --- ------
065 -- 00:00:7d -- Cray Research Superservers,Inc
068 -- 00:00:80 -- Cray Communications (formerly Dowty Network Services)
317 -- 00:40:a6 -- Cray Research Inc.

Here is the list of available options for MAC Changer

-h, -help

Show summary of options.

-V, -version

Show version of program.

-e, -endding

Don't change the vendor bytes.

-a, -another

Set random vendor MAC of the same kind.

-A Set random vendor MAC of any kind.

-r, -random

Set fully random MAC.

-l, -list[=keyword]

Print known vendors (with keyword in the vendor's description string)

-m, --mac XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX

Set the MAC XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX

If you completed the your MAC address changes you need to start the networking service using the following command

For Ubuntu Userssudo /etc/init.d/networking start

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11 thoughts on “Change your Network Card MAC Address on Ubuntu”

  1. For Ubuntu Userssudo /etc/init.d/networking stop doesn’t work for me still running i have hardy

  2. MAC Changer for Ubuntu 8.04 needs a GUI to make it as easy and convenient to use as various MAC changers are for Windows.

  3. Ubuntu Users who don’t know do to start/stop network services:

    To stop network services, enter this command:

    sudo ifconfig (network interface) down

    To start again:

    sudo ifconfig (network interface) up

  4. If I change my mac address, is the changes is permanent. How can I restore back my old MAC address.

  5. azwar: The change is not permanent. Reboot and your old MAC is restored. reboot is not neccesary to restore MAC, you can type:
    # macchanger –mac=XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX ethX

    XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX=your original MAC

    To show your original MAC, of course before you’ve changed it:
    # macchanger -s ethX

    What I want to know is why macchanger only works on ethX, and not my wlanX?

  7. sudo vi /etc/network/interface

    add “pre-up ifconfig eth0 hw ether 00:e0:4c:dd:7e:b3”

  9. after changing my mac address, it doesnt want to connect over a network.
    when tried to ping to dns, it says “destination host unreachable”
    but if i restore the old mac address, networking is fine.
    how to configure so that the fake mac address can connect to a network?
    please suggest

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