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Securing your network using MAC Addresses

All, this is a security/switch question so I came to this forum first

I have a problem with people just coming into our offices and plugging there laptops in without asking...:-| Im not best pleased with this but how do I remedy this?

My thoughts are to create a backbone using a layer 3 switch (we have 1 Cisco catalyst switch that we can use) and then create VLANS off of this onto our current switches (this is a seprate idea in that I want to *subnet* certain depts and remote users) ... anyway, my question is can I configure the Cisco switch to accept ONLY certain MAC addreseses? I know I have to build a list of all MAC addresses in the company, however Id rather this than take the chance of someone letting loose a virus just cos we have no *internal* security as such....

Anyone any thoughts on whether this is possible

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pseudocyber

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PennGwyn

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Dr-IP

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credmood

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Sorry Dr-IP I was a bit flipant with my *no security* statement. I have all the standard security measures in place, virus scans on all machines that update automatically, a software update service that updates MS holes, firewalls that stop the bad people getting in, I also *usually* vet people b4 they plug in, however as we all know you cant be sure with this %100 of the time...., as everyone says its the internal *physical* side of things that has the most flaws. I was just meaning your first line *Setting up something to keep people from being able to just waltz in the door with a laptop and plug it into the network is a good idea security wise* ...

The remote users are always a problem, however I need to a) turn spilt tunneling off and b) set up the cisco vpn client to *kick in* as soon as a connection to the internet is instigated....a problem that Im aware of and need to get round to doing....but as pseudocyber says time and money are not usually on our side ;o)

I'll check out all above, thanks for all your help

credmood

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All, I will be assigning points to you on this, Im just leaving it open until i get my catalyst switch (this coming week) in which im going to test some points from above

credmood

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The switch that I got was'nt up to the task, so Im going to have to bet some money from somewhere and buy a decent one....

Thnaks for all your pointers, I will be using them