Assigning same MAC Address to access points

Question

I am working on a mobile application project which works on a local wireless network located on multiple different geographic locations(some supermarkets).

In that for detection of that particular store for further processing we require MAC ID of that WiFi router, this works fine for a distance, But on vertical mutiple floors lets say 5, its not feasible,So for that we are planning for Access Points to extend it,

Now I would like know that can we configure the Access points with the same MAC address so that when app connects to network it can easily identify which store it is in. (I don't think it is possible but its a random thought)

or

we have to store all the MAC IDs of all the network equipment's to our DB for detection for that particular store.

or

we have to use the Unique SSIDs.

So what is the best solution.

Note: We are using the MAC ID (BSSID) as they are unique and can be accessed easily using some smartphone APIs. and local network has their local server which provides product details and other data to the device.

Answer 1

No. You must not assign the same MAC address to multiple access points. That breaks the network and I hope your access point does not even allow it.

Your best approach is to store the MAC addresses of all the access points you want to detect. As you mentioned, existing libraries and services already do it this way.

Having different SSIDs for different locations would work, but would make the network difficult to use for other purposes than this app. All the different SSIDs would need to be configured on the devices that actually use the network for moving bytes.

Answer 2

I think you should use the same SSIDs (customers automatically login in every store) and use unique MACs to identify the location/area the customer is in. List of consequtive SSIDs give you the most probable path through the store in 3D.

Learn and explore how others did this: Cisco's CMX, Euclid Analytics, Nordstrom.

Or for example this or this paper.

Finally note that you'll need to look at possible privacy issues