Rogue devices showing up on windows 8 network in file exporer.

Humm...

I thought that but I was concerned with the whole thing in general. I'll try that out though.

I appreciate that this thread has been running for quite a while, but having just found a 'rogue' phone on my 'network', I, too, have been hunting a solution.

Strangely, this is the only thread of all the forums I have searched that actually has the solution - but a lot of people seem to have missed it.

If, when you right click on the device and select 'Properties' you get something that looks like the image posted by SPTC on February 16, 2015 (a device with a Name, Model and Model number and a MAC address, but nothing else - especially no IP address), then the solution is in the first post on that same page, from chinups3 on September 24, 2014.

I hope they forgive me, but I have restructured [and added to] their response as follows, as it was easy to overlook:

I have a fix for a 'phone' [ or other unknown device] showing in windows 8.1 [ and 7, and 8 and 10] 'Network'.  Before you check your network for strange devices, if it is showing as a phone [or some other unrecognised device] in 'Network', do the following:

Go to 'Control Panel';

then 'Administrative Tools';

then 'Services';

then look for 'Windows Connect Now [- Configure Registrar]';

right click on it and select 'Properties';

set 'Startup type:' to 'Disabled' and click on 'Apply';

then click ''Stop' and 'Ok'.

Close the pop-up and all the Control Panel windows and refresh your 'Network' display and you will not see a phone [device].

There are no strange phones out there trying to attach to your network; it's nothing to do with your router; it's not a conspiracy by your neighbours to access your network.  It's a Microsoft "feature", and I shall be logging it with them, as they do not read any of these forums!!

My own suspicions is that the above service is 'seeing' your router and somewhere along the line it is detecting the chipset manufacturer of the router and looking that up in it's database of devices and finding a 'match' (in my case Huawei).  But the lack of an IP address is the key, as it means you'll never find it as a real device because it doesn't exist in the real world and therefore is not on the network.  It's a figment of Microsoft's imagination.

I have been having this issue as well.  It started off showing up on only one of my laptops and now it shows on both.  The curious thing is it shows up in my network devices but as soon as I see it and do a MAC search it disappears that second and another shows up in a few minutes.  One is an LG phone, another is a Lenovo computer, and another is an Amazon product and another is a Linux system.  I don't think it is harmless as the previous posters have noted.  If it were just a neighbor's phone. why would it disappear the second I discover it and do a search on it.  Why would some of these show up in Aruba as someone else suggested theirs are as well.  These are not neighbor's devices.  I hope someone can discover how to completely rid our systems of this.  Also, several times when I went to my router's webpage to sign in and change the network name and password, it said I had maximized the number of attempts to sign in.  Of course, I had made no such previous attempt.  This doesn't happen every time I go in but several since this has been happening.  I wait the allotted minutes and then I am able to sign in.  Ugh what a hassle.

why would other phones try connecting to secure wifi

Just to check.

I mean your answer is not wrong, what I'm getting at its why is your devices trying to connect when you can try to find networks, it just don't make sense. But have you tried finding your windows phone on your network?

That's a good point. Interestingly enough, I have never seen a Windows Phone do this. It's only ever been devices running an older version of Android.

I mean your answer is not wrong, what I'm getting at its why is your devices trying to connect when you can try to find networks, it just don't make sense. But have you tried finding your windows phone on your network? I don't think that you will find it, if you do then you must be doing something that is not known by most people, or people that know more than open up a browser and check email