This is an old revision of the document!

Throttling and Blocking Users

Introduction

In February 2023 we introduced an enhancement to MESHdesk and APdesk that allows you to throttle or block selected WiFi clients.
Sometimes the need arise to block a specified user on the WiFi network without disrupting the other users who are also connected. With this enhancement it can be done in a snap.
With capped LTE products there is a risk of using 'to much' data when using streaming services like YouTube. A few mouse clicks allow you to put a speed limit on WiFi clients in order to quickly and effectively reduce their data consumption.

Nothing like a real life example.
So Junior's friend came over and they were going to do some gaming.
Junior's friend is a nice guy but the laptop he came with looks a bit dodgy.
Soon after he connects to the WiFi the other siblings started with the Daddy the WiFi is broken drill.

Note that the top user is a MAC Address we have not yet give a name to. We can safely assume it must be the dodgy laptop.
Click on the Pencil Icon in the heading bar of Top 10 Devices to pop-up the Alias for MAC Address window.

After you created the alias for the device; click on Block Device (far right icon) in the heading bar to pop up the Block MAC Address window.
Since our suspicion about the laptop seems to be valid we will go to the extreme and add a Cloud Wide block.

Note we will have a visual indication of the devices that are throttled or blocked.

We got a nice Internet deal from one of our mobile providers with a capped month to month product.
Unfortunately since the LTE Connection is good some of the streaming sites Junior visits are opportunistic and streams had a high resolution which in turns deplete our data cap even before the month is over.
Since we are pro-active we select all the kids devices and apply a speed limit to them.

Again notice that we have a visual indication of the speed limit and also how much it is on those devices that are limited.