DigitalFence™

Updated April 15, 2024 15:36

Karl Shannon

What does the Fingbox DigitalFence do?

The Fingbox DigitalFence shows you all the Wi-Fi enabled devices within 15 meters of your Fingbox, even if they are not connected to your network.

The Fingbox DigitalFence is an extra security and troubleshooting feature for your network, and an additional form of Digital Presence.

Security: Physical security of your network is as important as cybersecurity. Physical access to your router, or the majority of IoT devices in your home, enable people to hack these devices. DigitalFence shows you the devices that are near your Fingbox and set alerts to watch them.
Troubleshooting: If you have a device the Internet does not work on, the DigitalFence tells you if that device's Wi-Fi antenna is still working, and which SSID and channel the device's Wi-Fi antenna is connected to.
Digital Presence: The DigitalFence shows you what is near your Fingbox in real-time and the historical logs of each device that has been in range of your Fingbox at set times. For example, you can see what time your dog walker arrives and leaves, or if your children are having a house party while you are away. You can also select devices to watch and receive alerts when they move in and out of range of the Fingbox.

Access the DigitalFence

Open Fing Mobile App
From Overview, click the Online devices widget or the blue See devices button
Click the Security tab
Scroll to the bottom of the page and click Digital Fence under the Improve your security heading

DigitalFence™ Features

Filtering Options: Filter what your Fingbox shows you by factors including time, distance from Fingbox and new/known devices to Fingbox
Summary: The number of filtered devices seen in your selected time frame
Devices’ Log: A list of all the new, known and anonymized devices seen by the DigitalFence within your filters
Graph: A graph of the DigitalFence activity under the filters you have selected
New Devices: A list of the devices Fingbox has detected for the first time within the set filters
Known Devices: A list of the devices Fingbox has detected before that have reappeared during the set time
Anonymized Devices: A list of the devices Fingbox has detected within the set filters that did not connect to a network and not revealed their real MAC address

Filter your DigitalFence search

Select the filters for what you want to see in your DigitalFence search.

To select a filter:

From Overview, click the Online devices widget or the blue See devices button
Click the Security tab
Scroll to the bottom of the page and click Digital Fence under the Improve your security heading. This will bring you to the Devices in range page. The filters are the pale blue buttons at the top of the page.

The filter options are outlined below:

Type (Devices)

This filter shows you either ALL of the devices that have been within range of your Fingbox, or just the new devices that have appeared. To check if someone has never been in your home before, filter the Fingbox to just show you new devices.

To use this filter click on the Type button in the Devices in range page.

Time (Time and date)

This filter shows you when devices are/were within range of your Fingbox at a time and date range of your choice. For example, if someone was due to visit your home early on a certain day, select to only see devices from that day and time.

Signal (Signal Strength/Range)

This filter sets an estimated physical range from the Fingbox. The DigitalFence can detect the signal strength of the Wi-Fi-enabled devices. The signal strength usually indicates the distance that a device is from your Fingbox. For example, if your Fingbox is near your front door and you know that only your dog walker and postal worker will approach the door that day, you could set the range of the DigitalFence to Very Near. This would allow you to only see the devices that came near to your front door. You can move the slider to change the range, and tune the range to find the right value that includes devices within the range of your home and immediate surroundings.

Excluding Devices

This filter removes a device from your search. If there is a neighbour's TV that you do not wish to see, select this device and click Exclude Device.

To access your list of excluded devices and add them back to your search:

Click the pale blue button at the far right of the Devices in range page
This will open a window called Settings. Click Excluded MAC Addresses.
Click the X icon beside the device

Excluding SSIDs

This filter removes any device connected to an SSID (a network) from your search. For example, if you do not want your neighbour's devices show up in your search, select a device on the network and click Exclude SSID. To do this:

Click the pale blue button at the far right
This will open a window called Settings. Click Excluded SSID.
Click the X icon beside the device

Device Filtering

There are a number of additional filters to further personalize your search:

Anonymized: Show or hide anonymized devices in your search
Access Points: Hide your neighbours' routers in your search
In my network: Remove all the devices in your own network from your search to declutter what you see

New, known and anonymized devices

To spot devices you want to see, the DigitalFence divides devices into the following categories:

New: A device that the DigitalFence has never seen before
Known: A device that the DigitalFence has seen before. Click the device to see a log of when the device was in the range of your Fingbox.
Anonymized Devices: A device that uses an anonymization feature to mask its identity

Fingbox DigitalFence tagging system

The DigitalFence has a tagging system that shows you more about a device's activity. The tags include:

Green: General Information

In my network: A device that is connected to your network.
Access point: An access point, such as a router.

Yellow:

Randomized: A device with a fake MAC address

Blue: Visit Patterns

[unique day]: A device that only appeared on one day, such as 28 Aug
[week day]: A device that only appeared on one day a week, such as Monday
Weekend: A device that only appeared on weekend days, such as Saturday and Sunday
Weekdays: A device that only appeared on weekdays
All week: A device appeared every day of the week

Dark Gray: Duration Patterns

Always on: A device within range of your Fingbox a very high percentage of the time
Long visit: If at least one long visit of over four hours took place
Short visit: If all visits are less than one hour

Watch a device and set up alerts

Click the Fingbox Dashboard (the circular icon with three dots at the top right of the page)
This will take you to the My Networks page. Under My Networks, select the device with the Fingbox icon beside it and click Close.
Click the Online Devices tab or the See devices button
Click Security, scroll down and click Digital Fence under Improve your security
This will take you to the Devices in range page. Under the graph, click New Devices.
Select a device and choose Watch device

You will get the option to name the device. For example, the postal worker. The device will appear in your network Devices list.

You will receive alerts about the device in the same format you have set up for other alerts on your Fingbox, such as push notifications, emails, or both.

Note: A watched device on your Devices list does not mean it is connected to your network. The watched device is on your Device list so you do not have to search for it in the DigitalFence anymore. The device will have 'In range' under it and a green eye symbol beside it. This tells you the device is in range (near) your Fingbox rather than connected to your network.

The DigitalFence's technology

When a device's Wi-Fi is turn on, it will publicly send out 'probing' radio messages to look for the best Wi-Fi connection, even when it has already connected to a network. Usually, this process is invisible to us, but sometimes we can see it. For example, when you walk around your house your phone automatically connects to your nearest extenders/router, or your phone suggests open Wi-Fi connections to use when you are in a café.

Fingbox has an antenna in it that lets it see these public radio messages. The DigitalFence lets you see these invisible messages in the Fing App.

Can the DigitalFence see all devices, even though it does not have a 5Ghz Antenna?

Yes. Devices that predominately transmit on the 5Ghz frequency also transmit on 2.4Ghz. To find the best Wi-Fi connection, 5Ghz devices will simultaneously seek a better Wi-Fi connection on the 2.4Ghz frequency. The device's searching on the 5Ghz frequency is not picked up by the 2.4Ghz antenna in the Fingbox, the simultaneous searching on the 2.4Ghz frequency is visible.

This process depends on the device vendor. In some cases, the transmitting on the 2.4Ghz may only happen sporadically. In this case, the device may not appear on the Device list.