alexxnica / spoof

Easily spoof your MAC address in OS X & Linux!

spoof

Easily spoof your MAC address in OS X & Linux!

Node.js port of the popular SpoofMAC Python utility (GitHub: feross/SpoofMAC).

Why?

I made this because changing your MAC address in OS X is harder than it should be. The Wi-Fi card needs to be manually disassociated from any connected networks in order for the change to apply correctly – super annoying! Doing this manually each time is tedious and lame.

Instead, just run spoof and change your MAC address in one command. Now for Linux, too!

Instructions for beginners

Here are some easy install instructions for complete beginners.

1. Install node.js (it's a programming platform like Python, Java, etc.)

2. Open Terminal. Let's use Spotlight to find it.

3. Install spoof by typing this command and pressing Enter.

npm install spoof -g

That's it! spoof is installed.

3. Now, let's print out the help page. Just like before, run this command in Terminal.

spoof --help

4. Now, let's print out all our network devices.

spoof list

5. Find the device you want to set or randomize the MAC address for in the list. Wi-Fi is usually called en0 on modern Macs. Then, run this command:

sudo spoof randomize en0

You may need to reconnect to the Wi-Fi hotspot you were connected to. But, that's it! Your MAC address is changed. You can confirm by re-running:

spoof list

Full command list

You can always see up-to-date usage instructions by running spoof --help.

List available devices

spoof list
- "Ethernet" on device "en0" with MAC address 70:56:51:BE:B3:00
- "Wi-Fi" on device "en1" with MAC address 70:56:51:BE:B3:01 currently set to 70:56:51:BE:B3:02
- "Bluetooth PAN" on device "en1"

List available devices, but only those on Wi-Fi

spoof list --wifi
- "Wi-Fi" on device "en0" with MAC address 70:56:51:BE:B3:6F

Randomize MAC address (requires root)

You can use the hardware port name, such as:

spoof randomize wi-fi

or the device name, such as:

spoof randomize en0

Set device MAC address to something specific (requires root)

spoof set 00:00:00:00:00:00 en0

Reset device to its original MAC address (requires root)

While not always possible (because sometimes the original hardware MAC isn't available), you can try setting the MAC address of a device back to its burned-in address using reset:

spoof reset wi-fi

(older versions of OS X may call it "airport" instead of "wi-fi")

On OS X, another option to reset your MAC address is to simply restart your computer. OS X doesn't preserve changes to your MAC address between restarts.

Linux support?

Linux support requires the ifconfig utility to be installed. It comes pre-installed with most Linux distributions.

Windows support?

If you need Windows support, consider using the Python version of this program, SpoofMAC. Or, please send a PR with Windows support and I'll accept it. You can see how it's implemented in the Python version. Thanks!

Automatically randomize MAC address on startup

If you want to set or randomize your MAC address and have it persist between restarts on OS X, consider using the Python version of this program, SpoofMAC, and following the instructions for running automatically on startup.

License

MIT. Copyright Feross Aboukhadijeh.