How devices are enrolled and named

Device enrollment is fully automated. Normally, no action is required as devices are listed automatically by its broadcast name, such as “ Johnny’s iPhone “.

Data is gathered from:

  • NETBIOS
  • DHCP
  • Service Discovery
  • ARP

When the above data sources don’t provide a name, the fallback is the first IP address encountered from a given MAC address.

Having the MAC address visible provides you with the best ability to control your Policies, which will follow the MAC address. In other words, if a device changes IP address, the Policy will still apply. If the MAC address listed on the dashboard does not match, that means that layer 2 visibility is not available. This can happen in the following circumstances:

  • A router is between your filtering service and the device
  • A bridge is between your filtering service and the device

Furthermore, the following are conditions where the broadcast name (NETBIOS) name may be unavailable to the filtering service:

  • Device has a firewall turned on
  • Device has NETBIOS bindings disabled
  • Filtering is run on a stand-alone mode (vs gateway mode)

Enrollment happens automatically upon the first received DNS query. Devices remain in the list until they are deleted/forgotten.