Patent ID: 11882093
Assignee: SR TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
Field: Digital communication (Electrical engineering)
Classification: CPC H | IPC G  H

Claim 0:
1. A method in an access point (AP) configured for medium access control (MAC) address designation (MAAD), the AP being configured to wirelessly communicate with a station (STA), the STA being configured to perform a plurality of associations with the AP, the AP being configured to provide a MAC address to the STA for each association of the plurality of associations with the AP such that the STA is identifiable by the AP without being trackable by a device other than the STA and the AP, the method comprising:
for a first association of the plurality of associations with the AP:
exchanging an association request and an association response with the STA, using a first MAC address as an STA transmitter address (TA) to initiate another association of the STA with the AP, the first MAC address being selected by the STA;
determining a second MAC address of the STA, the second MAC address being usable as the TA of the STA for a next association with the AP by the STA;
transmitting the second MAC address to the STA in one of a response action frame and one message of a multiple-message handshake process;

for subsequent associations of the plurality of associations of the STA with the AP:
determining a new MAAD MAC address for the STA, the new MAAD MAC address being usable as the TA of the STA for the next association with the AP by the STA, the new MAAD MAC address being different from a previous MAAD MAC address transmitted by the AP to the STA at a previous association; and
transmitting the new MAAD MAC address to the STA in one of another response action frame and another message of the multiple-message handshake process.