September 12th 2017 Updates

We at Mist are constantly working on making the Mist experience the best possible experience. So every week you will see new and updated cloud features. Here are the updates for September 12th, 2017.

Personal WLANs (requires alpha firmware 0.1.11687)

Mist is excited to announce patent-pending Personal WLANs, which are secure micro-segmented networks across a single WLAN.  These Personal WLANs are created by generating unique keys to access the SSID.  Each of these keys automatically creates a segment of the WLAN, isolated from the other Personal WLANs on the same network.  There is no limit for the number of Personal WLANs which can exist on a single SSID.

This is perfect for dorms or multi-dwelling units (such as apartment complexes) that provide WiFi services throughout the building.  Give each unit their own unique passphrase to access a common WLAN.  Now, everyone has a personal network only visible to those who logged in using the same passphrase.  Isolate your network devices such as printers and digital media players (Chromecast, Amazon Fire, etc) to your own personal network, hidden from users on other segments on the same network.  Your Personal WLAN is available across wherever the main SSID spans – this means access to your segment anywhere in the building, as long as a Mist AP running the main WLAN is within proximity.

To set up a personal WLAN, navigate to Network -> WLANs and create a PSK WLAN with multiple passphrases.  When setting up the keys, check the Configure as a personal WLAN box to enable a personal WLAN for each of the created keys.

This week we are releasing Phase 1 for Personal WLANs as an alpha release.  This also requires you to download the alpha version of our firmware to use this feature.

Here are some known caveats we currently have with Personal WLANs:

We require the multicast IP 224.0.0.251 and Port 9091 to be allowed in order to have a private WLAN between APs.

WiFi direct devices do not depend on a wireless network to operate, but instead connect to each other through a direct WiFi signal.  These connections are not restricted by Personal WLANs since they operate independently of a wireless network.

Currently, users depend on a network admin to create Personal WLANs for everyone by creating unique passphrases.  In the future (during the Phase 2 release) we will introduce Self Provisioning passphrases, allowing every individual to create their own passwords to use with their Personal WLANs.