Every now and then I login to my router at home to do some minor network management tasks and check out what is connected out of curiosity. The last few times I have noticed something called “GainSpand14d95” in the list.
Obviously, this begs the question, what is it?
I could rule out all of the major devices such as PCs, laptops, smartphones and tablets as they all identify themselves with familiar hostnames. The Wi-Fi printer has a weird name starting with HP so that wasn’t it either.
What it ended up being was the Fitbit Aria Wi-Fi scales that I bought a while ago. The Wi-Fi module inside the scale is provided by GainSpan but the device itself provides no way to change the hostname of the device (nor can you change it using the installer that you can run on a suitable computer). Not a huge security concern as I now know what the device is on the network but understandably could freak some people out if they happen to glance at the list of devices connected to the network.
Fitbit might consider changing the default name to something mentioning “Fitbit” or “Aria” to save people from unnecessary concern.
Update: 09/07/2015:
It seems that GainSpan provide Wi-Fi modules that go inside a myriad of other devices (not just the Fitbit Aria) so you might want to take that into consideration when you are tracking down devices on your Wi-Fi network. Thanks to Sean for that tidbit 🙂
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Thanks for this post – help me avoid tracking stuff down for hours and hours! ;]
I totally agree, would be good if they could change that. I was going to block the durn thing.
Author
Very glad that this saved you some time solving a mystery! 🙂
Ditto from me. Had no idea what this was and was not looking forward to tracking it down!
Author
My pleasure!
Same here. I was doing a spot check of my dhcp leases and came across this. Thanks so much for posting this info.
I just filed a firmware update suggestion to Fitbit. I suggest others do the same so that the GainSpan reference is changed for a FitBit one!
Very nice ideea!
Same here. I was searching the device since weeks.
Thank for the « unsolved mysteries special Fitbit episode »!
Author
No worries at all 😉
Seriously was about to start a massive device hunt.
Thanks for your research. I found myself just today wondering what machine that was. Saved me time.
Ah, thank you internet. I had run into the same situation, glad we’re all here to share information 🙂
Author
Glad you managed to find your answer!
Thanks a lot mate! I saw this show up in my client list… but had no idea what it was. It pushed a whopping 4kb of data in the past week, so it wasn’t a huge concern, but was still curious to know what it was and how it got my key!
Aaron
After a 45 minute device/mac address hunt on my network, it dawned on me “s**t, is this my fitbit scale?”. Thanks for confirming this 🙂
Thanks for the help. Stopped a panic attack.
Thank you from me also – I thinking about filtering it via MAC address but you post meant I knew what it was 🙂
Author
No worries!
FYI – while MAC filtering will stop casual “hackers” from joining your network (if they manage to guess the password) it won’t do anything to stop the more cluey ones as they will just scan your network traffic for a valid MAC address (which is unencrypted over any Wi-Fi) and then use that one to join the network.
Same here. This was super helpful, you saved me a lot of time.
For me it was a wireless thermostat from Lennox.
I was racking my brain trying to figure out what that could be!! I was even beginning to get suspicious of neighbors’ kid turning hacker-wi-fi-crackers. Then I read your post here and remembered, “WE HAVE A FITBIT ARIA!!!”
Funny how I take for granted that thing uses wi-fi for my convenience.
Thanks for your help, Boyd! Have a great day. 🙂
GainSpan produces small wifi chips aimed at IoE devices. Fitbit Aria is just one “user” of these GainSpan chips. Another company that uses them is Lennox in their iComfort thermostats.
Author
That’s actually a good point, Sean – thanks for sharing!
I’ll update the post to reflect what you’ve mentioned.
Thanks! It’s my thermostat. Now I can rename it.
THAnks! I have both the Fitbit Aria and the Lennox thermostat. Definitely don’t want to disable either one!
Keeping this post alive and relevant. I too was about to do some massive detective work. Ran a quick google search and found this post. Such a time saver! Thank you for posting!
I just saw a GainSpanxxxxxx (last six characters of MAC address) client on my router, lookup yielded a Delta Electronics registration and some info on GainSpan producing low-power wireless chips for IoT devices. Wondered if it was my Aria and stumbled across this; thanks! Fitbit should really label this.
This was driving me nuts after I had upgraded to a new router that shows a map of everything on my network and this popped up. I’d been searching for what this was for a couple of months. Thanks for this posting since I now know it’s my FitBit Aria wifi scale. Yep FitBit should definitely change it’s listed name for routers so it won’t drive people nuts trying to figure it out
Thanks for keeping the thread going. I too just found GainSpanxxxxxx on my network and was about to start tracking it down.
Thankfully this post is a first page result on a search for Gainspan. You have saved me a lot of time, so well done and thank you.
is there a list of default usernames and passwords for the Gainspan product line?
Author
Not aware of default credentials for Gainspan products, sorry.
I also found this on my network. It turned out to be my Lennox Smart Thermostat.
Searched GainSpan, thankfully ended up here to find my answer. Saw GainSpan using a couple of different software, Who Is On My WiFi and Wireless Network Watcher , the latter actually showed extra text regarding the GainSpan. Found out it was in my repeater.
Same here. Thanks for saving me the time to disable the device only to then have to re-enable it once I figured out my fitbit scale wasn’t working!
When Gain Span popped up on my network I was about to go high to the right and then found your post–definitely saved me some sleuthing and aggravation.
Thanks for this! Aria guilty here, too!
Many thanks for the info. I was about to visit my neighbors with a baseball bat .
It was my ring doorbell
I have two THINK ECO smart adapters from ConEd. I suspect they use GAINSPAN. Is anyone else seeing this(Gainspan) on your router?
It was a ThinkEco WiFi modlet for me.
It was a Lennox iComfort WiFI thermostat for me.
Thank you so much! I was very close a panik attack, but you saved my evening. Thank you young lad.
Yes I have a coned Think ECO adapter as well.
Robert J Lafayette, Think ECO does use gainspan. I was breaking my head trying to figure out what the heck is connected to my router since everyone seems to point to a fitbit yet I do not own a fitbit. I tested by unplugging my think eco and it was removed from my wifi. I plugged it in and then it re-appeared. The thinkeco was the cause for me.
Thanks for the post!
Found out the gainspan usage on my account is from my Ring Doorbell…
Ugh.. This seems so typical of companies in this day and age. Lets put proper names and security on connected devices so that people can effectively manage their networks. Nah, lets be lazy and cheap and make this as difficult as seemingly possible.
Anyway rant over thank you for the information as like others before me it saved me significant concern and time.
I noticed this “Gain Span” MAC address when I hooked up my wifes new Profrom 400i treadmill.
Gain Span is a provider of Ethernet IoT’s modules.
They are cheap for system integrators, so you’ll start seeing them pop up in Wi-Fi IoT mundane devices , and home appliances.
Thank you!!
That mac address has been a “?” on my list for a while now. It’s the Aria like you said.
They also make modules for HUE Wi-Fi lighting products for example the HUE GO shows up as gainspan in my CUJO firewall…
Can anyone here help me identify MegaWell 7F6C? I purchased a Brother laser printer and a Epson inkjet printer a few weeks ago. I installed the infinity xFi app a few days ago and now I see this MegaWell on my WiFi. It says it has just connected to my WiFi for the first time tonight. Don’t confuse this with MageWell which comes up on Google search. That is a different word. MegaWell is what I am searching for. Here is a screen shot. It has no IP address, no model or operating system. Hostname
10:5b:ad:1d:7f:6c , and the MAC address is 105BAD1D7F6C. Can anyone help me identify this to find out if someone is trying to Hack into my WiFi?
Found out the Mac # was my new Brother printer by printing out the network report on the printer itself. (Picked that suggestion up on this forum post replies. So thank you for that.) Don’t know why internet Mac number searches did not have a match. I hope this help someone else.
Got one today. I’m guessing it’s the iRobot- we call it Bob