A recent WiFi - iPhone problem was resolved recently at Duke University. At first it was feared that the iPhone was causing a problem with the WiFi network in the campus by barraging the servers with thousands of media control access requests a second, effectively knocking out the wireless access points. As many as 20 to 30 WAPs at a time was knocked out because of the MAC requests.

Recently though, the problem was resolved and the Campus' wireless network provider, Cisco, fixed a glitch in their systems. Apparently, the problem lay within the network and not entirely on the iPhone. A statement released by Cisco stated that the wireless network at Duke University "experience[s] some minor and temporary disruptions in service" given a "particular set of conditions." The specifics of what this set of conditions entail was not enclosed with the statement.

Van Baker, research Vice President at Garter in California, believes that the problem was something unique to the system at Duke University. Other universities also use the the Cisco system using the same kind of infrastructure and they did not experience any problems similar to what Duke experienced. Baker surmises that the Duke system has an encryption system not incorporated in the iPhone and that caused the glitch in the system which caused the WAPs to get knocked out.

Baker further explains his theory by explaining that "Cisco's LEAP (Lightweight Extensible Authentication Protocol) is an enterprise deployment not seen in the consumer market at all. The iPhone doesn't have a lot of the features you'd normally expect to see in an enterprise class phone."