Tell me more ×
Ask Different is a question and answer site for power users of Apple hardware and software. It's 100% free, no registration required.
up vote 4 down vote favorite

My home wifi network is password protected, as it should be. My neighbor's is not. Because I have password protected my network, my computer continually joins my neighbors instead of mine. I have moved my network to the top of the list of the "preferred" wireless networks, but if my network is down for whatever reason my computer just re-joins the neighbor's network. I don't want to join my neighbor's network, ever. Is there a way to make it so that my computer will never join a particular network, i.e. "blacklist" it?

share|improve this question

1 Answer

up vote 6 down vote accepted

Remove it from the list of "Preferred Networks" and it will stop auto-connecting.

  • Go to "System Preferences" > "Networks" prefpane.
  • Choose "AirPort" (or "WiFi" on Lion) on the left.
  • Click the "Advanced" button.
  • In the resulting sheet, choose the "AirPort" (or "WiFi") tab. (It should be the leftmost.)
  • Select your neighbor's wifi network in the list and hit the "-" (minus) button.
  • Live with joy at never [auto-]connecting there again!
share|improve this answer
1  
As an aside, the order the networks are listed in is the order your computer will attempt to connect. If your network is higher than your neighbors, it will prefer yours -- it's not necessary to remove it. – Henry Jackson Sep 11 '11 at 20:39
Unfortunately, this is not always true. I have two wireless networks at my office, the "official" semi-broken one, and an "unofficial" one that some of us put up. There are also several neighboring networks. My unofficial network is in my list before the official one, but i often get the official one :( A real blacklist would be great. – Dan Pritts Jan 29 at 21:22
@DanPritts That would probably be because your Mac saw the "official" network before the "unofficial" one, and connected to it. You'll have to remove the official network to prevent future connections. (As an aside: what would a blacklist do that removing the network doesn't?) – CajunLuke Jan 29 at 21:35
I agree that that's why it's happening. I know that it's reappeared after I removed it with the method you describe. That said, I can't say definitively that I never again approved connecting to the "official" network, which would put it back on my approved list. To answer your question, then, a blacklist would have it never show up under the available networks tab when the mac first tried to connect. – Dan Pritts Jan 29 at 22:23

Your Answer

 
discard

By posting your answer, you agree to the privacy policy and terms of service.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.