I HACKED my Internet Service Provider's router. So I could get rid of it.

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[tomazzaman]

Wow. I didn't see this coming. Thanks everyone for kind words of support, I'll do my best to answer to everyone asap, but there are so many of you it'll take me a minute or two. Much love! ❤ (And for all of you who have subscribed - or are about to - a warm welcome!)

[svenr]

Since 2016 there's "Freie Routerwahl" (free choice of router) in Germany by law. The ISP has to provide you all the login data and has to allow using whatever router you want. It's great.

[AndMart]

I know the feeling, in the UK, Shell Energy's new wi-fi 6 router is so locked down that you can't even change the default admin password. Talk about putting the needs of the ISP above the security of the user.

[myfriendjohn]

This is a perfect reverse engineering of the box and what is done. Fair play mate.

[mattex]

As a fiber optic technician in Italy i can say that here (and i actually think in all europe) the ISP is forced by law to give you a way to use your own router. I work for the company that manages the infrastructure, so we work for every ISP that uses it, we install mainly 3 types of devices: Direct PON (Fiber direct to modem/router), SFP (SFP Module in router), external ONT (External terminal that you connect to a router's WAN. I first and usually second case the ISP will provide an ONT to allow you to use your own router.
Anyway the ISP using FritzBoxes use 7530/7590 for 1gbps and 5530 for 2.5gbps

[Benk]

Ive always had a problem with the way ISPs force you to do things their way. It was satisfying to watch someone with your skills solve the problem

[khatharrmalkavian]

It would be an awesome move to figure out what the ISP uses to log in to the original router and run a service that responds to them trying to enter your network with some kind of "access denied" message.

[sajiretto]

Very satisfying video. I can hear the screams from the ISP all the way here.

Decades ago I made an IPcop router out of an old PC. I had some ISP problems and called their support and they went babbling about "click on the windows icon..." and trying to make me reboot my PC since that was their normal approach to all problems even if it was unrelated. I told them that I didn't run windows on that machine and that it didn't work for any of the other machines I had behind my router.

Uttering the word "router" made the supportdesk person go ballistic screaming that I need to remove it and that I was not allowed to use such periferals "and and and..."

Quite interesting how things develop over the years.

[pchvgel]

Fun fact: Forcing you to use a specific router is illegal in Germany

[piekay]

Since you mentioned AVM: yes they are very popular here, specifically because their routers are easy to use, but much higher quality than what your ISP might give you (in Germany it’s illegal to lock down the connection)

[hankscorpio]

That router looks like something you'd find in a Fallout game.

[patvb]

I don't think I really understood half of what you explained, but I just loved what you were doing ! Keep at it, stay free !

[shankthebat]

I wondered how you in particular got into my feed. When I realized you were from Slovenia, it all made sense. I've been listening to Siddharta all day.

[pendent]

Speaking as an engineer in the ISP space-

I'm fairly surprised they didn't offer other a plain (non-router) ONT or have a bridge mode function built into the router, at least for a business customer. It's very normal for a fiber ISP to want to have control over the ONT device and to authenticate the customer based off of the serial number - you don't have the convenient authentication mechanisms with GPON that you get with DOCSIS and there has to be a way to verify you're providing service to a paying customer. The TR-069 support is also quite normal as it's how the provider is able to actually support home users and believe me when I say this is absolutely a requirement in this day and age. The really odd bit is them not providing a way to bypass all of this: business customers will generally not want to be forced into putting their equipment behind the NAT on a soho router. Though it sounded like there might be a 1918 IP on the WAN interface so maybe they're doing some sort of fucked up CGNAT that doesn't comply with the normal standards. Perhaps this was only used for communication between the router and the SFP?

I suspect they're a smaller provider and doing a number of fairly odd things here, at leastpartially in a misguided attempt to save money with regards to the router. I am very curious what would happen if they ever wanted shut you off for non-payment - maybe they can just de-auth that serial number but there's a decent chance they'd just be sort of stuck until someone realized they could just physically disconnect you.

[kojack]

A lot of work. A whole lot of work. We all know what countless hours means when it comes to such...projects. Thanks a million for your time, effort and sharing all that work and many many hours with us. The very leat I can do is like and subscribe.

[sgt_retiredcharlie]

Tomaz, that was some really great troubleshooting there! I can only imagine how many "billable" hours it actually took you to get to were you are at the end of the video! I only just found your channel and since I'm a retired Network Admin from the US Air Force and US Army, you have definitely earned my SUB brother! Now I'm going to go watch your Router Build video! (Love your accent, LOL) Keep up the great videos and G-d bless you!

[DaveEtchells]

What a crazy amount of effort, and requiring such advanced knowledge. Congrats on beating “the system” in the end!

[TilenTravnik]

And I thought I had a cool solution when I convicted the ISP to turn my Frizbox into a pass-through mode.

[linuxgeek]

Here in NZ, you are provided with a basic ONT which you can plug your own router into.

Also, the companies that manage the fibre network are by law not allowed to be an ISP, which leaves a more free and open market for internet service provider's.

If I was forced to use a locked downed router, I would be very upset; Happy that you managed to find a work-around, although you shouldn't have to.

[james]

Brilliant vid! Loved the investigation works that you did. I completely understand the feeling of doing anything and everything you can to get your ISP's grubby hands off of networking kit that sits inside your own house.