What is the full form of MAC?

The full form of MAC is the Media Access Control Address. The hardware id number is another name for the MAC address. In particular, the MAC address entered by the manufacturer at the production time is still there on every computer’s NIC (network interface card), whether it be a Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, or Ethernet card. Nortel, Dell, Nortel, and Cisco are just a few well-known NIC manufacturers. Changing the NIC cards could change the system’s provided default address.

A Brief History of MAC

• Humans can presume that Xerox PARC researchers first discovered the existence of MAC addresses as far as history is concerned.
• A network device’s MAC address can also refer to the physical address, hardware address, or ethernet hardware address, among other related terms.
• The term “burned-in address,” most frequently used with Cisco Router Switches, applies here.

Features of MAC

• Users can connect to a network on their computer using the NIC, a circuit card. The data is converted into an electrical signal that may be sent via the internet.
• Consequently, a system has a hardware address that includes an IP address.
• MAC addresses align with network adapter hardware, while IP addresses are tied to TCP/IP.
• The MAC address’s first six digits, or OUI, are used to provide manufacturer information (Organizational Unique Identifier).
• The manufacturing company assigns the last six digits of a network interface control system.
• The network instantly recognises the number, so we don’t need to keep the address in mind.
• The IEEE Registration Authority Committee assigns the MAC prefixes to their licenced vendors.

Benefits of MAC

• The expenses of systems that link to a network are either free or nonexistent.
• They have a switch policy in place. Regardless of who is attached to it, it may have mounted permitted machinery or non-authorized equipment.
• A different MAC address is assigned for each user connected to the same network subnet.
• Due to MAC addresses’ efficiency, diagnosing network issues, including IP addresses and other factors, is made easier.
• With MAC addresses, network management may reliably identify information sent and received on the network.
• The only explanation is that MAC addresses do not change over time, unlike dynamic IP addresses.

Limitations of MAC

• A MAC address can only have up to 2 24 different addresses per OUI by the same producer since the first three bytes (OUI) are reserved for them.
• We may assert that MAC address sorting is simple to fool. Ethernet is a broadcast protocol; therefore, one can operate covertly and only listen to and from authorised MAC addresses.
• An attacker can typically enter a network by repeatedly altering his MAC address to an authorised one.