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Block wireless users from wan subnet?

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badbob001

Occasional Visitor
I have a spare AC68U and want to use it to allow wifi users to only access the internet. Can I connect the AC68U's WAN port to my LAN, set it's subnet to be different from my LAN's, and have the users only be able to access the Internet but have no access to my LAN? I guess I basically want those users to not be able to access anything on my LAN except for the LAN gateway. The AC68U will have it's own DHCP server for the wifi users but the WAN port's ip will come from the LAN's DHCP server.
 
This will only work the way you want if the AC68 is the first router. And any device connected to the second router will be able able to see all devices on the first router even though they are in a different subnet.

Sent from my 9024W using Tapatalk
 
You can plug in a LAN cable from your main router's LAN port to the WAN port on the spare RT-AC68U and use it in router mode (double nat) and only use the Guest WiFi with full isolation enabled.

If your main network is in the 192.168.x.x range, I suggest to use the 10.x.x.x or the 172.16.x.x - 172.31.x.x ranges.

Test to make sure that no Guest Network clients can connect to your main network and you should be set.

HTH. :)
 
You can plug in a LAN cable from your main router's LAN port to the WAN port on the spare RT-AC68U and use it in router mode (double nat) and only use the Guest WiFi with full isolation enabled.
That doesn't isolate the guests from the main router's LAN. Quite the opposite in fact.

To block access to the main LAN in this configuration the secondary router would need to have a Network Services Filter rule which blocked all traffic to the main LAN's subnet (e.g. 192.168.1.x).
 
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@ColinTaylor, in my experience, that depends on the routers used. :)

That is why I suggested testing to ensure no access. We could then respond further.
 
@ColinTaylor, I've stated this before but I will repeat it here (can't find that post right now).

With two RT-AC68U routers, being connected as ISP, R1main and R2secondary and R1main having an IP range of 192.168.1.x and R2secondary having an IP range of 192.168.2.x the following was observed.

The R2secondary routers' users could access the main routers' LAN.

The R1main routers' users could not access the secondary routers' LAN.


Both R1 and R2 routers are in Router mode. With a LAN port/cable of the R1 router plugged into the WAN cable of the R2 router.

This is repeatable across many networks for a few years now.
 
With two RT-AC68U routers, being connected as ISP, R1main and R2secondary and R1main having an IP range of 192.168.1.x and R2secondary having an IP range of 192.168.2.x the following was observed.

The R2secondary routers' users could access the main routers' LAN.

The R1main routers' users could not access the secondary routers' LAN.
Agreed. That was exactly the point I was making. You appear to have been stating the opposite in post #3. Maybe I was misinterpreting what you wrote.
 
With two RT-AC68U routers, being connected as ISP, R1main and R2secondary and R1main having an IP range of 192.168.1.x and R2secondary having an IP range of 192.168.2.x the following was observed.

The R2secondary routers' users could access the main routers' LAN.

The R1main routers' users could not access the secondary routers' LAN.

Both R1 and R2 routers are in Router mode. With a LAN port/cable of the R1 router plugged into the WAN cable of the R2 router.
The physical layout you described is what I'm envisioning. My R1 router is an AC86U connected to the IPS. The R2 router is my AC68U connected to the LAN of the AC86U.

BUT I don't want R2 users to access the R1 LAN (except to get to the internet via the R1 router). I don't need or care about R1 users accessing R2's network.

I think I just need to be able to set outgoing firewall rules on the R2 router to block ip ranges used by the R1 LAN. But the firewall options are limited to:
  • inbound rules
  • url filter
  • keyword filter
  • network services filter (port ranges)
How about LAN > Route? Would putting R1's LAN network there with a bogus gateway do anything?

Would it help if I don't put any users on R2's LAN ports?
 
Creating a black hole route would work (provided it doesn't conflict with the default route). As I suggested above you can achieve the same result with the Network Services Filter. You don't have to specify ports with the NSF. If you leave that field blank it will apply to all ports. You will have to create one rule for UDP and another for TCP.

With NSF, depending on which firmware version you're using you can specify the entire upstream subnet as either 192.168.1.0/24 or 192.168.1.*.

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Creating a black hole route would work (provided it doesn't conflict with the default route). As I suggested above you can achieve the same result with the Network Services Filter. You don't have to specify ports with the NSF. If you leave that field blank it will apply to all ports. You will have to create one rule for UDP and another for TCP.

With NSF, depending on which firmware version you're using you can specify the entire upstream subnet as either 192.168.1.0/24 or 192.168.1.*.

View attachment 24356
View attachment 24357
I tried the black hole route method first and at first it seemed to work but then it didn't after I switched my client's ip from between the two subnets a few times.

On R2 router:
  1. In Lan > Lan IP, change router ip to 192.168.100.15. Note that subnet of R1 router is 192.168.1.x.
  2. In Lan > Route, add
  • network/ip: 192.168.1.1
  • netmask: 255.255.255.0
  • Gateway: 127.0.0.1
  • Metric: blank
  • Interface: LAN
Then I tried NSF and it does seem to work! At first I ignored it because I thought it was limited to just port ranges but it's not (just like you said). This is what I used (R1 ip range is 192.168.1.* and R2 ip range is 192.168.100.*):
  • Filter table type: Black List
  • Filtered ICMP packet types: 0 8
  • Rule 1: Destination IP: 192.168.1.* TCP
  • Rule 2: Destination IP: 192.168.1.* UDP
I've only tested by changing my wifi client's ip between the two subnets. Any other hacks that users would try to try to get around my restrictions?

If this is really the answer, then asus should implement it for guest networks under aimesh/multiple-ap.

Thanks!
 
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Also, tried to block wifi users from accessing R2 router's management interfaces but NSF rules don't seem to work for that. Maybe Asus don't want us to accidentally block ourselves from the router, though I do have enabled management from WAN (which is R1's LAN)?

NSF rules I tried:
  • Destination: 192.168.100.15, Port Range: 80, Protocol: TCP
  • Destination: 192.168.100.15, Port Range: 8443, Protocol: TCP
  • Destination: 192.168.100.15, Port Range: 22, Protocol: TCP
 
Also, tried to block wifi users from accessing R2 router's management interfaces but NSF rules don't seem to work for that.
The clients still need to be able to talk to the router otherwise they can't get DHCP and DNS (and as you say, the ability to make changes to the router). Trying to block the access with NSF won't work as NSF only effects LAN to WAN and you are trying to block LAN to LAN.

To create a more fine-grained access to the router from its LAN you could create a custom firewall script (if you're using Merlin's firmware). YazFi already has an option that does that for you for guest WiFi networks.

P.S. You can restrict access to the router by IP address using the Access restriction list in the webUI. So you could restrict web/ssh/telnet access from only 192.168.1.0/24.
 
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Agreed. That was exactly the point I was making. You appear to have been stating the opposite in post #3. Maybe I was misinterpreting what you wrote.

I guess I didn't make it clear enough (sorry). :)

Using a higher IP address for the main router will give the OP what he wants.

Specifically, if the main router had a "192.168.(greater than '1' range).x" IP range and the secondary router's Guest network was used with a "192.168.(less than '2').x" range.
 
Using a higher IP address for the main router will give the OP what he wants.

Specifically, if the main router had a "192.168.(greater than '1' range).x" IP range and the secondary router's Guest network was used with a "192.168.(less than '2').x" range.
Sorry, I don't follow this at all. Are you talking about something different from the original question now?

I can't see why the IP address ranges would be relevant (provided they don't overlap), and what you're saying is the opposite of the example you gave in post #7. :confused:
 
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@ColinTaylor, sorry, really busy these past few days.

The example is different because of the information I provided later.

When I had a 'main' router with a higher IP address, a secondary router with a lower IP address wasn't able to access it (but the main router could access the secondary router though).

From what I remember, right now. :)
 
When I had a 'main' router with a higher IP address, a secondary router with a lower IP address wasn't able to access it (but the main router could access the secondary router though).
It doesn't matter whether subnets are numerically higher or lower than each other. The only thing that matters is the routing and firewall rules.
 
I would agree with you that is how it should work. But that is not my experience. At least, not with Asus routers.
 
I would agree with you that is how it should work. But that is not my experience. At least, not with Asus routers.
And yet that is how the OP has got his setup working now (primary=192.168.1.x, secondary=192.168.100.x). There are also numerous other posts in these forums where Asus users have configured their primary router as 192.168.1.x and the secondary as 192.168.2.x. I myself was running exactly this setup for a while with my AC68U and N66U.
 

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