Super Bowl to handle 30,000 Wi-Fi users, sniff out “rogue devices” | Hacker News Reader

Super Bowl to handle 30,000 Wi-Fi users, sniff out “rogue devices”

arstechnica.com

40 pointsiProject37 comments

I feel like 30,000 concurrent users is woefully underestimated. The article says "During the Super Bowl, the network will be able to handle up to 30,000 simultaneous connections, which should be enough." but I wonder where that estimate came from.

I would double that, in my estimates, given the kinds of people even capable of securing Super Bowl tickets. W're not talking about a fair sample of the US population here, we're talking about 80k at-least middle class fans, which I'd imagine raises the likelihood of a wireless-capable device being in their pockets significantly.

Again from the article: "As long as 100 percent of the people in there don't take out their cellular device and switch it to the Wi-Fi network, it should be fine."

Given the fact that it's an open network, why do these people even need to take out their device at all? Many phone will jump onto an open network if at all possible, won't they?

I'd be interested in a post-mortem after the event to determine the effectiveness of the Wi-Fi plan.

> Many phone will jump onto an open network if at all possible, won't they?

I've never seen a phone that will do that by default. You have to manually join a network at least once before it'll be added to the list to auto-reconnect.

I believe it is (or was at some point) an option for the iPhone, and a few other phones.

I've always found it silly, because in my experience, "Open network" never means "just connect and it will work". At best, you have to agree to a few terms of service (which requires action from me), at worst, you have to authenticate and/or pay or there is another security measure preventing access (MAC whitelist, etc).

I rather doubt that, as it would be a big security problem. If phones auto-connected to open APs, anybody could run a rogue one and collect passwords, sessions, etc.

It is, and people do, from what I understood.

I might be wrong, though, or it might have been something that's since been rectified. I use a "feature" phone now, so I don't actually know what the most current phones do.

Autoconnecting to an open wireless network and then to a VPN afterwards would circumvent that problem. It'd be nice and convenient.

Definitely not on the iPhone. The closes it comes is automatically displaying a list of available networks if there are any and you aren't connected to wifi, and letting you connect to one if you explicitly ask for it.

> in my experience, "Open network" never means "just connect and it will work". At best, you have to agree to a few terms of service

Nope, an office/research park around here has one, in the central building with restaurants and shops, that you just pick from the WiFi list and are on with no fuss.

I've seen McDonalds' networks like that, too (though some have user/pass to fill in a login screen, but with keys printed in the the same screen). Depends on the setup supplier, I guess.

By default, my Nexus S will notify me when an open network is available but it will not connect automatically unless the wifi SSID matches an SSID I've previously connected to. I would be surprised if any device would be set up to just connect to any available open network, it would be terribly insecure.

As it is, I'm disappointed that I can't configure my device to only automatically connect to SSIDs with certain matching MAC addresses. I consider it fairly insecure that it will simply assume that "linksys" is trustworthy anywhere in the world just because my ex girlfriend lived out on a farm where wifi security wasn't worth the hassle.

> it will simply assume that "linksys" is trustworthy anywhere … just because … on a farm, wifi security wasn't worth the hassle.

Amusing anecdote and yet another argument for much more intelligent defaults (I’m thinking of network names).

Just because 100% of the audience is capable of using wifi doesn't mean that 100% of them will be using it simultaneously.

Tickets cost a minimum of $2,000 on stubhub.com for nosebleed seats.

This event only happens once a year.

People really want to see this thing live.

With a drink in one hand, popcorn in the other, and a smile on their face, I would be surprised if more than 10% of the audience was glued to their phone at any one given time.

The article points out that during the 3 hours of the Superbowl, only an average of 11 minutes is actual playing time. That's a lot of downtime where fans in those $2,000 seats will be watching replay videos, uploading their own, and checking stats.

Although, I'd imagine there'd be a deluge of connections any time there's an interruption in the game. Which, given that this is football, seems like it'd happen pretty frequently.

Depends on the age of the audience. I'm guessing it would be skewed to an older crowd, but I wouldn't put it past young people (under 30?) to want to connect to wifi and use their phone all through the game. I am continually amazed how many people use cell phones in situations where they shouldn't need them (movies, dates, etc).

From the article:

At last year's Super Bowl in Indianapolis, Wi-Fi from 604 access points supported 8,260 simultaneous connections at its peak, while 12,946 attendees were on the Wi-Fi at some point during the game.

Seems like support for 30,000 simultaneous connections should be ample.

From past experience, planning for 30,000 simultaneous connections is in the right range. What they don't cover is peak association rate (how many people per second can associate to the APs and have the LWAPS/controllers not fall over. They also don't cover the connection rate (number of devices per second pulling and clicking through the AUP/whatever page). Simultaneous users is actually less of a problem than the rate at which those simultaneous users connect.

I think the majority of people will be absorbed in the game and entertainment. When I go to a sports game it has to be a poor match for me to start laying with my phone. I might check it while waiting in line for a hot dog or something, but the number of people wandering around << the number of people in their seats.

what game? you mean the downtime between the rare actions? I enjoy football, but the way it's monetized by the NFL is simply sickening.

True, but irrelevant.

You will essentially have zero cell coverage in the stadium.. iphone / imessage users can use the wifi to send/receive texts... "hey need another beer?"

Better not use that microwave in your luxury box, the Mercedes-benz-superdome-FCC will be on your ass in a hot second.....

For the curious, this is a small scale map of what they'll be viewing: http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/collateral/wireless/ps5755/p...

I would be really curious to what the wireless spectrum looks like at an event like that. Most football fans won't bring more than a phone, but with 80,000 people there will be some outliers. Maybe someone decides to bring a walkie talkie set that works over the 2.4 Ghz band, lots of people with bluetooth headsets, or other odd bluetooth devices. Wireless cameras can ruin Wifi on the same bands.

Monitoring 'rogue' devices is actually a requirement of all parts of a business that handle credit card transactions (PCI). It's to prevent card card data from leaking out of a planted wireless device (small device plugged into bag of a register/pc, etc). That's one of the main drivers for this technology existing beyond anything else.

> Well, maybe not. The NFL manages to spread 60 minutes of clock time across three hours in a typical game. What with time running off the clock between plays and the typical play lasting about four seconds, an average game ends up with only 11 minutes of action.

Setting aside the fact that this entire paragraph was irrelevant to the point of the article, it always irritates me as a (college) football fan when people cite this statistic. There are far more than 60 minutes of "action" from kickoff to the final play. Most of American football is actually about strategy - if you're completely ignoring what happens between when the play is whistled dead and when the ball is snapped next, you're going to be very confused, and I wouldn't be surprised if you didn't enjoy it.

But we can all agree that TV timeouts suck when you're in the stadium.

I wonder how many people are going to be sniffing the open network.

As a percentage, I'm calling 2%

I'm guessing the number will be closer to 2 than 2%.

What is the overlap of "people with enough money and interest to go to the super bowl", and "people who know how to sniff open wifi, and actually bother to", and "people who would bother to at this event"?

I mean, I know how to sniff wifi, putting me I suspect in a already small portion of the general population. Even so, I haven't bothered in years; I have better things to do. Sure, some people may sit in coffee shops and do it for monetary gain, but will those people be buying superbowl tickets?

I wouldn't be surprised if 2% of the crowd at DEFCON was sniffing the wifi at any point. But at the Superbowl? People don't bring laptops to the superbowl.

I think that is wildly optimistic. I'd be surprised if 2% were not drinking, though there may be some overlap.

The only thing more dangerous than bored hackers is drunk bored hackers.

Bur seriously, with only 11 minutes of action in a 3-hour event, 2% may be realistic.

The 11 minutes number assumes that you don't consider the formation (and constantly changing formations) before the actual play is run to be interesting.

Although the Super Bowl isn't known for attracting "true" fans, I would hope that "true" football fans would appreciate the intricacies that take place before and after the plays are run.

Edit: And honestly you think 1,400 people are going to be trying to sniff the WiFi from within the Super Dome?

Is the issue interference or they want to stop people taking pictures and sending them or offering free hot spots?

They don't want some rogue devices screwing it up for everyone else. The stadium is offering free WiFi, so there's no attempt to block communications and there is no need for kind souls to offer free WiFi.

Is this even legal? Aren't the frequencies used by wi-fi explicitly set up to be unregulated by the FCC? Can a private company force you to turn off a device legally operating on those frequencies?

They don't make you turn off anything. You simply can't bring it in. Just like you can't bring in your own food or drink. The FCC and radio spectrum legalities don't enter into it.

One person with WifiKill[0] is going to spoil it for everyone.

[0] http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1282900

They claim to have spectral analysis solutions. Does that mean they are going to zero in on the offenders? It is probably technically possible.

It's a Cisco setup so they will be using their CleanAir feature to identify and triangulate sources of interference.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/netsol/ns1070/index.html

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