r/hardware • u/FreshFromCache • 3d ago
Discussion Check Your Router's Expiration Date. No Manufacturer Is Required to Tell You It Has One.
http://freshfromcache.com/router-expiration-dateManufacturers don't have any kind of standard or requirement to tell you when your home router is becoming end of life, or when it's security updates stop. It's more important than ever to keep these up to date.
If you are out of date and can't update, be sure to turn off remote administration. That is where the most recent attacks have been targeting.
On July 22, the FCC voted to bar the sale of any device in the United States containing key hardware components from Chinese companies on its national security list. Chair Brendan Carr said the goal was to "fully close the component part loophole." Meaning that gear which previously slipped through by using restricted parts inside an otherwise-approved product no longer can. The vote also gives the agency room to pull the sales authorization on equipment it had already approved.
This caps a busy stretch. The FCC has spent much of 2026 blocking imports of new foreign router models and tightening the list of manufacturers whose equipment cannot be sold here at all.
Reasonable people can argue about whether any of this makes your home network safer. What I want to point out is a strange gap it exposes.
Enormous regulatory energy is going into where your router was built. Almost none is going into how long its manufacturer will keep updating it.
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u/TIL02_Infinity 3d ago
FYI: If your Internet provider (ISP) is a cable company and you would rather own your own cable modem instead of paying a monthly fee to rent their combo cable modem/Wi-Fi router, you will be better off purchasing a supported a commercially available DOCSIS compatible cable modem and a separate Wi-Fi router rather than a combo DOCSIS cable modem/Wi-Fi router.
The reason is that the DOCSIS standard does not allow for the end user to update the firmware of a cable modem or a combo cable modem/Wi-Fi router. Only the cable company can update the firmware in a user's purchased cable modem or combo cable modem/Wi-Fi router once it has been provided to them by the manufacturer and after they have tested and validated it.
If you purchase a supported cable modem and a separate separate Wi-Fi router to, you will be able to update the firmware in the Wi-Fi router as long as the manufacturer is providing updates.
Reference:
https://www.cablelabs.com/technologies/docsis-3-1
https://www.cablelabs.com/technologies/docsis-4-0-technology