You can use any of those methods to configure a Mikrotik router, you don't have to use Winbox. Winbox has a couple of nice features over the web interface: -

You can use any of those methods to configure a Mikrotik router, you don't have to use Winbox. Winbox has a couple of nice features over the web interface: - the ability to connect over raw ethernet (rather than IP) which is useful if you've misconfigured the firewall or routing tables - the ability to broadcast packets to discover new, unconfigured Mikrotik devices Winbox has previously downloaded components from the router to enable the UI to update the available options based on the firmware on the device. These components are part of the firmware update provided by Mikrotik, which is itself signed and verified before the firmware update is applied. But yes, they were missing a follow up check between Winbox and the router itself, to ensure the router itself was not tampered with.