networking - Windows 10: Phones appearing in Network

Yesterday, Network listing on Windows 10 file explorer showed me one external phone. Thus, I changed my router WiFi password just in case.

Nevertheless, I checked this today and I found 5 new phones appearing randomly for a few seconds.

I've found a similar question here, but no solution.

Here is an screenshot:

If I double click that I see: Model: LG-E465g, MAC: 48:59:29:b4:8d:87.

This happens on two PCs that were recently upgraded to Windows 10:

• one is connected through Ethernet (desktop PC)


• the other through WiFi (and I disabled Bluetooth)

I hadn't seen this issue before. I guess these are phones trying to connect to my network, I just don't understand why Windows shows them if they are not connected to my router.

Update: If I hide my SSID this issue stops. As soon as my router SSID is visible, phones start appearing again.

Update 2: I tried MAC filtering but is useless.

Answer

I've found this thread on Microsoft forums. This issue is related to Windows Connect Now.

Solution: I disabled WPS (also called WCN in Windows) on the router.

In the forum, someone solved this by disabling the Windows service "Windows Connect Now". If you have many PCs on the network that solution is not the best. So, modifying the router setting for WPS stops this for all PCs.