I put out there that MACs can be spoofed, but the majority of script kiddies and 10 year olds aren’t going to bother with port sniffing. The initial communication between a client and the AP can be sniffed for just about anything, esp. if the AP is unsecure.
I’ve used a wireless security auditing program to sniff unsecured neighbor’s wireless APs, printed out a report of their passwords typed during the sniff, and knocked on their door with the printout in hand and said, “Secure your wireless network. If I can get this, imagine what malicious people would do with it.”
They initially rebuked me for poking around, one guy even called the police, but when they understood that I was trying to help, they actually paid me to come over to secure their network. One cop laughed when he was talking to me privately and said, “I should have you come over and do my network too!”
MAC filtering is just another tool. It’s not the best tool, but adding multiple layers of abstraction to your wireless security makes attacks less likely. The lower your risk footprint, the less likely you’ll be hacked randomly.
I was taking issue with how you portrayed the level of protection it provides and level of difficulty it presents in overcoming it.