Key Timeouts during WPA rekeying

Ben Gamari bgamari.foss at gmail.com
Sun Oct 18 17:37:23 EDT 2009


Recently I've been trying to setup a WPA2-protected access point using
hostapd on Broadcom B44 hardware. I can currently associate with the
network and achieve quite reasonable speeds with low packet loss,
however after 15 minutes or so, hostapd begins experiencing key timeouts
during WPA rekeying. After this failure, all clients are disassociated
and cannot reassociate until hostapd is restarted. Frequently it is
necessary to restart hostapd more than once in order for clients to
again associate. This is seen in the log below[1]. What could cause a
timeout such as this?

Although I haven't tried enabling debugging output in the b43 driver, it
gives no indication of any major errors. I have another card coming
soon, so I should soon be able to verify whether this is hardware
dependent or not. Any assistance you could provide would be greatly
appreciated. Thanks,

- Ben


[1] Hostapd log of failed rekeying
wlan0: WPA rekeying GTK
WPA: group state machine entering state SETKEYS (VLAN-ID 0)
GMK - hexdump(len=32): [REMOVED]
GTK - hexdump(len=32): [REMOVED]
WPA: 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA_PTK_GROUP entering state REKEYNEGOTIATING
wlan0: STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA: sending 1/2 msg of Group Key Handshake
WPA: Send EAPOL(version=1 secure=1 mic=1 ack=1 install=0 pairwise=0 kde_len=40 keyidx=1 encr=1)
Plaintext EAPOL-Key Key Data - hexdump(len=40): [REMOVED]
wpa_group_setkeys: GKeyDoneStations=1
wlan0: STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA: EAPOL-Key timeout
WPA: 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA_PTK_GROUP entering state REKEYNEGOTIATING
wlan0: STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA: sending 1/2 msg of Group Key Handshake
WPA: Send EAPOL(version=1 secure=1 mic=1 ack=1 install=0 pairwise=0 kde_len=40 keyidx=1 encr=1)
Plaintext EAPOL-Key Key Data - hexdump(len=40): [REMOVED]
wlan0: STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA: EAPOL-Key timeout
WPA: 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA_PTK_GROUP entering state REKEYNEGOTIATING
wlan0: STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA: sending 1/2 msg of Group Key Handshake
WPA: Send EAPOL(version=1 secure=1 mic=1 ack=1 install=0 pairwise=0 kde_len=40 keyidx=1 encr=1)
Plaintext EAPOL-Key Key Data - hexdump(len=40): [REMOVED]
unknown vendor specific information element ignored (vendor OUI 00:10:18 len=9)
STA 00:14:a4:1e:1e:04 sent probe request for broadcast SSID
unknown vendor specific information element ignored (vendor OUI 00:10:18 len=9)
STA 00:14:a4:1e:1e:04 sent probe request for broadcast SSID
unknown vendor specific information element ignored (vendor OUI 00:10:18 len=9)
STA 00:14:a4:1e:1e:04 sent probe request for broadcast SSID
unknown vendor specific information element ignored (vendor OUI 00:10:18 len=9)
STA 00:14:a4:1e:1e:04 sent probe request for broadcast SSID
wlan0: STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA: EAPOL-Key timeout
WPA: 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA_PTK_GROUP entering state REKEYNEGOTIATING
wlan0: STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA: sending 1/2 msg of Group Key Handshake
WPA: Send EAPOL(version=1 secure=1 mic=1 ack=1 install=0 pairwise=0 kde_len=40 keyidx=1 encr=1)
Plaintext EAPOL-Key Key Data - hexdump(len=40): [REMOVED]
Checking STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 inactivity:
  Station has been active
wlan0: STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA: EAPOL-Key timeout
WPA: 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA_PTK_GROUP entering state REKEYNEGOTIATING
WPA: 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA_PTK_GROUP entering state KEYERROR
WPA: group state machine entering state SETKEYSDONE (VLAN-ID 0)
nl_set_encr: ifindex=4 alg=2 addr=(nil) key_idx=1 set_tx=1 seq_len=0 key_len=32
WPA: 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA_PTK entering state DISCONNECT
hostapd_wpa_auth_disconnect: WPA authenticator requests disconnect: STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 reason 2
WPA: 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA_PTK_GROUP entering state IDLE
WPA: 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA_PTK entering state DISCONNECTED
WPA: 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 WPA_PTK entering state INITIALIZE
nl_set_encr: ifindex=4 alg=0 addr=0x9741278 key_idx=0 set_tx=1 seq_len=0 key_len=0
   addr=00:1c:bf:35:58:a6
wlan0: STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 IEEE 802.1X: unauthorizing port
wlan0: STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 IEEE 802.11: deauthenticated due to local deauth request
STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 sent probe request for our SSID
MGMT
mgmt::deauth
deauthentication: STA=00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 reason_code=2
Station 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 trying to deauthenticate, but it is not authenticated.
STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 sent probe request for broadcast SSID
STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 sent probe request for broadcast SSID
STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 sent probe request for our SSID
STA 00:1c:bf:35:58:a6 sent probe request for broadcast SSID


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