How to change MAC address

When it comes to networking, then most of us probably heard of MAC addresses. This article is all about, what is the MAC address? What it is used for? How to change MAC address?

What is MAC address?

MAC address is stands for Media Access Control address. It is a unique, physical, and permanent address that is assigned to network interface devices by their manufacturers.

So, whether it is your wireless card or ethernet card, each one of these comes with a permanent, physical and unique address, known as Mac address. So, there are no two devices in the world with the same MAC address.

This address will always remain the same for a specific device, even after you unplug it from your computer and plug it into another computer, it will never change.

As we all know that the IP address is used to identify computers and to communicate between devices on the internet. But MAC address is used within the network to Identify devices and transfer data between various devices.

Thus, each piece of data or packet contains the source MAC address and destination MAC address. So, those data packets can flow from the source device to the destination device.

Why change the MAC address?

As we all know the MAC address is a permanent, physical, and unique address of a device, which is used to identify the device, thus changing the MAC address will be increase your anonymity.

Not only that, but the MAC address is used by various filters to prevent or allow devices to connect to a network and do specific tasks on the network.

So, changing the MAC address of your device to another device will allow you to impersonate other devices, and allow you to do the thing that you will not able to do with your MAC address.

Thus, changing the MAC address will allow you to bypass filters, and you will be able to connect to specific networks, with which devices with specific MAC addresses can connect.

Benefits of changing a MAC address

1. Increase anonymity
2. Impersonate other devices
3. Bypass filters

How to change MAC address in Kali Linux?

Changing a MAC address is very simple in Kali Linux.

1. First of all, open up a terminal in your Kali Linux.
2. Now type sudo ifconfig command to list all the interfaces available and press enter.

• Now note down the interface name of which you want to change the MAC address. Note the MAC address of that interface also. In our case it is wlan0.
• Now the first thing to change the MAC address is to disable the interface of which you want to change the MAC address. To do so, type the command sudo ifconfig <interface name> down and press Enter. 
  • In our case, we will type sudo ifconfig wlan0 down
• Now for changing MAC address type sudo ifconfig <interface name> hw ether <new mac address> and press Enter.
  • In our case, we will type sudo ifconfig wlan0 hw ether 00:11:22:33:44:55
• Now enable the interface by typing the command sudo ifconfig <interface name> up and pressing Enter.
  • In our case, we will type sudo ifconfig wlan0 up

• Now to check type sudo ifconfig again and press Enter. You will see that your MAC address is changed to new MAC address you specified in Step 4.

Now you can start using that interface, and it will appear to have MAC address you specified.

How to change MAC address in Windows 10?

Changing a MAC address in Windows is easier than changing in Kali Linux.

For that you have to download a free tool named Technitium MAC Address Changer.

You can download it from here: https://technitium.com/tmac/

After downloading it click on generate random MAC address and the click on change MAC address, your MAC address will be changed.

I hope you will find this article informative. If you have any issues or queries, please let me know in comments.