Wireless Networks

[stickman]

One of the perks to moving to a big city is the availability of broadband internet. With broadband internet comes the ability to connect more than one computer to the same internet connection. This is very nice if you have more than one computer and more than one person who wants to be on the internet at the same time.

I had a choice between a wired and a wireless network. Since we are leasing the house we're in, I didn't want to do do a wiring job, so I chose wireless. I purchased all the components (wireless router, network card for my desktop computer, and a wireless card for my notebook)and set out to get it all hooked up. I managed to get it all hooked up and working without much trouble and a little help from Linksys Tech Support.

Last night, as I'm working, I caught a bit on TV about hackers who drive around looking for homes with unprotected wireless networks. These hackers use these unprotected wireless networks to access child porn, send spam e-mails, hack other people's computers, sned viruses, etc.... Ol' Stickman gets to thinkin' "Hey! This could happen to me!" I sure don't want to be a target of some exhaustive FBI or Homeland Security investigation! Needless to say, today I've been brushing up on protecting my home wireless network!

I knew the possibility of someone outside my home accessing my wireless network. I just, for some reason, think it couldn't happen to me. Well, you know how Murphy's Law works! I'm usually a prime example of many of his laws. Needless to say, I wanted to head this potential problem off before it became a PROBLEM! After doing my homework, my wireless network is now encrypted, locked down, and protected.....at least till someone figures out how to hack into it! If someone wrote the book on protecting it, there's someone else out there who knows how to get around it!

If you got wireless at home, better be looking into protecting your network from outsiders before someone comes knocking your door down!

[Bamaeagle]

Very Good point Stickman. You would be the one responsible even if you did not do the crime. You should always protect your system from hackers.

[bamaraised]

I agree....when I moved back to Millbrook we purchased cable internet and have a wireless network...I will be doin' my homework also in order to better protect my household from falling victim to a hacker.....any pointers Stickman?

[0ldman]

check on linksys website, many of their routers have a firmware update to prevent an internet attack from locking the router. There was a vulnerability, they fixed it.

[demopolite]

I'm on a wireless network at the law school that is password protected. It's protected through linksys.

My BF and his roomies have set up a wireless network at their house, also. I understand what you are talking about with unprotected networks because when I try to access the network at BF's house, I can usually pick up at least five other unprotected networks. If I were so inclined, I could do anything I wanted with their ISPs.

[0ldman]

The password protection is generally the shortcut to encryption. It is easier than remembering a 10 or 26 digit encryption key.

I can't tell you how many completely open wireless networks there are in Demopolis... quite often I'll use my laptop at someone's home or office and pull up a wireless network that is completely vulnerable, not even a password set for the admin page.

[Brian]

If you do WEP 64bit Encryption, you just need to keep a 10 digit alphanumeric Hexadecimal Key. Also, Turn OFF SSID Broadcasting. This way, your wireless network won't show up in a general SSID search. You just need to make sure you know the SSID and manually put it into your config for your wireless device.

[stickman]

If you do WEP 64bit Encryption, you just need to keep a 10 digit alphanumeric Hexadecimal Key. Also, Turn OFF SSID Broadcasting. This way, your wireless network won't show up in a general SSID search. You just need to make sure you know the SSID and manually put it into your config for your wireless device.

I did 128 bit WEP encryption and did in fact turn off SSID broadcasting. I also enabled MAC filtering. All instructions were provided from the Linksys Tech Support on their website. The instructions were easy to follow and took just minutes to carry out.

[stickman]

I agree....when I moved back to Millbrook we purchased cable internet and have a wireless network...I will be doin' my homework also in order to better protect my household from falling victim to a hacker.....any pointers Stickman?

My advice to you is to check the Tech Support section of your wireless router's manufacturer for instructions on how to lock it down from outside access. If you are using Linksys, their instructions are really easy to follow and will only take a few minutes of your time to put them into place.

[stickman]

Furthermore, I have Norton Internet Security in place on my computer. This is another level of security to help ward off hackers.

[mikew]

I personally know many people nationwide and several right here in Demopolis that drive around town and "fish" for wireless networks to jump on. In fact I know many people that have been using their neighbor's wireless networks for internet access for over a year now without their neighbors even knowing. So it DOES happen a lot.

I setup networks all the time and the biggest problem I see is that most people want their networks setup so all the PCs on the network can all access each other and each other's hard drives in addition to sharing internet connections and printers. And they want it wireless. They give very little thought to security. When (not if, but when)someone access your wireless network that's setup like this then they also have the same access to those PCs.

You can protect wireless routers from being accessed like that but they are sold with this protection turned off. Reason being that any novice can then buy one and get it up and running without troubling their tech support. Takes a little more time and trouble to setup the security features. Also once you setup the security on one you'll need to maintain it. It's new technology so there are still quirks. You'll come in one day and not be able to access the internet or network. You'll need to readjust or reset your security settings. So when I do setup a secure wireless network for someone eventually they'll call me back to fix this or that because of these quirks.

I notice that now some of the Internet Security packages have a built in feature to alert you when someone connects to your wireless network. Here's a link:
http://www.digitalriver.com/dr/v2/ec_MAIN.Entry17c?CID=0&SID=16269&SP=10023&PN=52&PID=40116

Anyway it's a fact that a wired network is more secure than a wireless network. Unless you go thru the extra pain to setup and maintain the necessary security settings someone WILL enter your network.

[0ldman]

Given that full security is enabled on wireless, it can be more secure than most consumer level wired networks.

Take any business network, if you can plug into it, you can gain some form of access. If you secure any off the shelf wireless router or access point, you can keep 99% of would be physical network hackers off. The 1% would have to clone a mac address to even get started.

Once physical access is granted to the network, its only a matter of time. Consumer level wireless vs consumer level ethernet, wireless is more secure, assuming you have more than a handful of network jacks available...

[mikew]

Well I'm going to agree to disagree. The open-air nature of wireless networks make the signal available to anyone with a receiver that's within range. Just because you encrypt it doesn't mean that someone won't break the encryption much like DirecTV. With a wired network you got to actually get to the wire and if the wires are all inside your building then they would have to get inside the building to access it. We all know that no network is entirely secure. There are many different levels of security but whenever you allow access by open-air broadcast vs having to actually physically connect to the cable I believe that's not going to be quite as secure. Here's a link to a white paper on it.

http://compnetworking.about.com/cs/wireless/f/arewlanssecure.htm

[mikew]

I'd like to add that as I said before, if you don't know to enable security on wireless networks they're wide open. Stickman opened this up saying he wasn't aware and found out later about enabling security. Unfortunately this is the case with most home users. I've been preaching the vulnerablilities of wireless network security since they came out with wireless networks and still I hear people saying they didn't know about it. Like I said before, these products come with the default of the security being OFF. You gotta know to turn it on and you gotta know to maintain it like changing the encryption keys from time to time. Here's another link.

http://www.linksys.com/splash/wirelessnotes.asp

In fact the net is full of links talking about how to secure wireless networks. You won't see that many articles about securing wired networks because security is a much bigger concern with wireless than with wired.

Also check out this site:
http://www.isaac.cs.berkeley.edu/isaac/wep-faq.html

[stickman]

Any computer that is in one way or another connected to the internet is not completely safe from anyone. If it can be hacked into and someone wants in bad enough, it's gonna happen. The only way to keep your computer data safe is to keep it in a stand-alone computer in your home which is NOT connected to the outside world in any way. Now, how much fun is that? Not very, but at least your data is safer than if you were connected to the internet.

If you're gonna be on the internet, then do what you can to protect your system. I am trying to protect mine as well as I possibly can. There's still a mountain of stuff I don't know about computers, hacking, networking, and other assorted stuff, but I'm learning!

[0ldman]

Debating whether wireless or wired is more secure can be beat to death and never have a clear, concise answer.

I was primarily playing devil's advocate, however I don't feel wireless is any less secure than wired in 90% of applications.

By the time you factor in Mac filtering and encryption, not counting any OS security features, consumer level wireless is more secure, as in someone can stand within your wireless realm and not be able to crack it. If someone can plug into your hub/switch/whatever, once physical access is gained, software can be broken. Its easier to set up a packet sniffer on a network than it is to pick up a wireless signal on any of 11 different channels with a 128bit encryption and mac address filtering.

Enterprise wireless vs wired is an entirely different game.

[dave]

I have the "old" wired network going in my house. Except for having to run a line to the other computer (which I made Jeff do) and create the cat-5 ends (which I made Buckblasta do) it relatively easy to set up.

[mikew]

Yep I use the old wired system too. It's not that I'm against wireless I just think people should know about the security aspects which most people don't. When asked I always say if it's not a problem running the cable then run it. If it's a difficult to run cable then go wireless BUT turn on the security. Like I said earlier I personally know many people that drive around town jumping on wireless networks without the owners knowing it but I don't know of anyone that drives around town and hops onto wired networks.

[0ldman]

I agree, wired over wireles if possible. Wired is faster, generally more stable and has more available bandwidth.

[Buttercup]

I personally know many people that drive around town jumping on wireless networks without the owners knowing it

If they can afford gas to drive around town 'fishing', they're obviously not worried about the 20 buck a month internet access fees, so why bother, unless they're into something alot more shady than just pirating internet access? You say you know quite a few locals doing this. What's their motive? Just bored and looking for a challenge?

[aubie]

Most likely they are just looking for something to do and something to get into. If given the chance, however they might wreak havoc. This seems a little more sinister that rolling yards etc. I was not aware of the vunerabilities before and had considered buying a loptop/wireless when I recently replaced my computer. I am now glad I did not.

[0ldman]

I was not aware of the vunerabilities before and had considered buying a loptop/wireless when I recently replaced my computer. I am now glad I did not.
This is one reason I stress that wireless can be secure. it isn't a big risk, it is only risky if you plug it in and just start using it. Generally the routers/access points come with a CD to run a setup utility that will assist in securing the wireless network.