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Second hand seller has sold a lot of routers. Is there a chance they have been hacked in some way?

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Nirvash

New Around Here
I'm looking for an Asus router to expand the wireless coverage in my home and I'm searching on the second hand market. I've found several AX86U at 180€ when new from Amazon goes for 310€, so it's a great deal.

This seller has sold 6 routers in the past and has 2 other routers currently available for sale. That's kinda weird... that's why I wanna ask what are the chances of these routers being hacked in some way. I would factory reset and flash Merlin right away, but still, it seems iffy.

What are your thoughts?

(I could only fit 4 routers in the screenshot, website automatically translated from Spanish)
 
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I'm looking for an Asus router to expand the wireless coverage in my home and I'm looking at the second hand market. I've found several AX86U at 180€ when new from Amazon goes for 310€, so it's a great deal.

This seller has sold in the past has sold 6 routers in the past and has 2 other routers currently available for sale. That's kinda weird... that's why I wanna ask what are the chances of these routers being hacked in some way. I would factory reset and flash Merlin right away, but still, it seems iffy.

What are your thoughts?

It's your call.

OE
 
I think you're overly worried. You're going to hard reset the device and then flash known-good firmware, right? That would fix anything short of fairly high-tech hardware modifications. If you think you are a sufficiently high-value target that somebody would be going to such lengths to infiltrate your system, then no, don't buy second-hand gear. (In fact, if that is you then you should be questioning the bona fides of new gear too.) But if you're just an average joe without nation-states on your tail, then this is unnecessary paranoia.
 
I think you're overly worried. You're going to hard reset the device and then flash known-good firmware, right? That would fix anything short of fairly high-tech hardware modifications. If you think you are a sufficiently high-value target that somebody would be going to such lengths to infiltrate your system, then no, don't buy second-hand gear. (In fact, if that is you then you should be questioning the bona fides of new gear too.) But if you're just an average joe without nation-states on your tail, then this is unnecessary paranoia.

HEH. Yeah I'm not a high profile target to no one, it should be fine. You are right, I overly worry about this kind of stuff. :p Thank you for your response!
 
Make sure the router is set to the correct region for where you live.
 
This seller has sold 6 routers in the past and has 2 other routers currently available for sale. That's kinda weird...
FWIW, that sounds more like the kind of hobbyist who likes to experiment with new WiFi gear ... like a bunch of us on these forums. If he were really in the business of infiltrating customers' networks, he'd have to put out a lot more than 6 booby-trapped routers to have a chance of snagging a target that was worth the trouble.
 

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