Replying to Wireless Safty

Haha. I have to agree with many people that say wireless networking is a bit risky and dangerous as well. And to the one who said having wires is dangerous (tripping and hurting your computer... bringing it down and wasting thousands of dollars) - that is ... errr... a reality but you're taking it to the extreme. I mean, it's you being careful. But still, wires is good.

I think wired systems are faster than wireless system.. in my opinion. Stronger connections and safer too, while wireless and not AS strong but also have the tendency to get intercepted by (sometimes) unwanted variables.

And me, being the slow IT guy, got myself a router and a wireless USB adapter. My computer is 1 floor down and 6~8 meters away from the place but still.. it's horribly slow (most of the time).

There's still a lot of questions need to be answered about these problems but I don't know where. Meh.. sucks

Since I have been using a wireless network for the last six months I have been rather surprised at the speed and incredible range of security options. Just looking at the list of things you can do which WeaponX has provided, should give you some idea. What he doesn't say is that all these thing are as easy as clicking an option in the process of setting up your network. But I think the most important thing is that the access to your network is physically limited. Someone has to be pretty close by in order to make the attempt. Furthermore I have been rather surprised at how numerous wireless networks are. And most people seem to have made no security precautions at all. Anonymity and avoiding being a target (by using nonstandard non Microsoft software for example) is one of the greatest protections on the internet. Hackers are not so common that one is likely to be in your immediate neighborhood, so the physical limitation and numerous wireless unprotected networks provides a great deal of this anonymity.

Wireless now a days is very much secure. It is as secure as any other stuff as long as you are following the security standards & guidelines.

Upgrade 802.11b devices to 802.11g. 802.11b is the most common type of wireless network, but 802.11g is about five times faster. 802.11g is backward-compatible with 802.11b, so you can still use any 802.11b equipment that you have. If you're using 802.11b and you're unhappy with the performance, consider replacing your router and network adapters with 802.11g-compatible equipment. If you're buying new equipment, definitely choose 802.11g.


You may also try some of these other ways to improve your wirless experience.

Position your wireless router (or wireless access point) in a central location. When possible, place your wireless router in a central location in your home. If your wireless router is against an outside wall of your home, the signal will be weak on the other side of your home. Don't worry if you can't move your wireless router, because there are many other ways to improve your connection.

Move the router off the floor and away from walls and metal objects (such as metal file cabinets). Metal, walls, and floors will interfere with your router's wireless signals. The closer your router is to these obstructions, the more severe the interference, and the weaker your connection will be.

Replace your router's antenna. The antennas supplied with your router are designed to be omni-directional, meaning they broadcast in all directions around the router. If your router is near an outside wall, half of the wireless signals will be sent outside your home, and much of your router's power will be wasted. Most routers don't allow you to increase the power output, but you can make better use of the power. Upgrade to a hi-gain antenna that focuses the wireless signals only one direction. You can aim the signal in the direction you need it most.

Add a wireless repeater. Wireless repeaters extend your wireless network range without requiring you to add any wiring. Just place the wireless repeater halfway between your wireless access point and your computer, and you'll get an instant boost to your wireless signal strength. Check out the wireless repeaters from ViewSonic, D-Link, Linksys, and Buffalo Technology.

Replace your computer's wireless network adapter. Wireless network signals must be sent both to and from your computer. Sometimes, your router can broadcast strongly enough to reach your computer, but your computer can't send signals back to your router. To improve this, replace your laptop's PC card-based wireless network adapter with a USB network adapter that uses an external antenna. In particular, consider the Hawking Hi-Gain Wireless USB network adapter, which adds an external, hi-gain antenna to your computer and can significantly improve your range. Laptops with built-in wireless typically have excellent antennas and don't need to have their network adapters upgraded.

Change your wireless channel. Wireless routers can broadcast on several different channels, similar to the way radio stations use different channels. Just like you'll sometimes hear interference on one radio station while another is perfectly clear, sometimes one wireless channel is clearer than others. Try changing your wireless router's channel through your router's configuration page to see if your signal strength improves. You don't need to change your computer's configuration, because it'll automatically detect the new channel.

Reduce wireless interference. If you have cordless phones or other wireless electronics in your home, your computer might not be able to "hear" your router over the noise from the other wireless devices. To quiet the noise, avoid wireless electronics that use the 2.4GHz frequency. Instead, look for cordless phones that use the 5.8GHz or 900MHz frequencies.

Update your firmware or your network adapter driver. Router manufacturers regularly make free improvements to their routers. Sometimes, these improvements increase performance. To get the latest firmware updates for your router, visit your router manufacturer's Web site.

Pick equipment from a single vendor. While a Linksys router will work with a D-Link network adapter, you often get better performance if you pick a router and network adapter from the same vendor. Some vendors offer a performance boost of up to twice the performance when you choose their hardware: Linksys has the SpeedBooster technology, and D-Link has the 108G enhancement.

Any encryption, as has been stated before, is better than none. Unless you have files that would be of direct interest to people (such as important business files) if two networks are in the area, and one is encrypted, and the other isn't, 9 times out of ten (or more) the unencrypted network will be accessed. However, if only one encrypted network is in the area, it will probably be accessed if possible. That being said, WEP encryption, even WEP-128 bit has been hacked. WPA (I beleive) has also been recently hacked, but it is much harder and more time consuming to do so. So I recommend WPA encryption if you can. Also, don't share files between computers that are of sensitive nature unless you need access to them from all the computers in your home. If files aren;t shared, even if someone gets into the network, they will have a hard time getting access to the files. So if you are careful, wireless networks are very secure.

~Viz

Just a post for people thinking about going wireless... what do I think about it? I feel its safe. If you get the right router people will be able to get in but be in hacker limbo unless there extreamly skilled, and those people probably wont hack you but go after bigger fish (unless you are a big fish)

What do you think?

Wireless routers are definitely the way to go for home networking solutions if the home isn't already wired for CAT-5. I bought my first wireless router a few years ago when 802.11b was the fastest it could potentially go. Nowadays there is Wireless-B, Wireless-A, Wireless-G, Wireless-A/B, Wireless-G with MIMO, etc, etc. Obviously the speeds have increased as technology gets better.

But the one thing I haven't noticed increasing is the level of security. Aren't most default WEP/WAP keys encrypted at 128-bits? I'm going off the top of my head, but I don't know of any routers that are using 258-bit encyrption.

If someone does get a wireless router, there are a few things you absolutely NEED to do first before you assume everything is setup correctly.

1. Disable SSID broadcasting. This is basically a the signal your router emits to let other wireless devices know that it is there. You do NOT want other people to know that there is an available wireless router. This needlessly increases the number of pings to the router and exposes it to potential hacker intrusion.

2. ALWAYS use encryption to protect your wireless router. If it only be simply 64-bit encryption, then so be it. However keep in mind that the higher the bits the "tougher" the protection. This will keep low level war drivers out of your network and using up your bandwidth. Be aware that even if you have encryption enabled, it will not keep out sophisticated hackers out of your network. There are tools available that are called packet sniffers. This means that this tool will collect packets of data out of the air which are transmitted. The packets of data are each encrypted with the WEP or WAP key. After enough packets are collected, then the tool should be able to decrypt the packets and finally be able to give you the key to access the router. So don't always believe that your wireless router is hacker proof.

3. Change the default login and password. Even if you hide the router from other wireless devices, the listings of factory default passwords are available online. So if I know the brand and model number of your wireless router, I can look for the default login and password to access it.

That's all I know about wireless routers, so take my advice and protect your network.

I have a wireless router that simply routes our internet connection through and I think it is great.
I just about always have a strong connection from my room (which is right next to the router) and have a good connection, if not excellent, all around the house.

I have enabled WPA encryption, MAC address filtering and it no longer broadcasts the SSID. I am not that concerned about security as my town is very small, some 400 people, of those 400 people around 3 would have sat up a wireless network and regularly use it (including me) as well as the community hall (I picked up the signal once).
I really don't think anybody would know how to set up wireless on their laptop let alone hack into my internet connection.

It depends on how many devices you are going to be networking really, in my opinion you should ditch wireless and get some wired panels installed into your house, then use a wired network. There are a number of good points that a wired network has over a wireless one:

1. Speed, wired networks are faster because it doesn't need to travel through air

2. Security, you really need physical access to the devices and the house if the cables are routed through the roof etc to hack into it, even still if you use a router the hackers still going to need to set it up. In short a wired network is MUCH harder to hack without being detected.

3. Reliability, wired networks don't drop out or lose signals. What i've found is that some wireless network routers say they can go up to like 10 meters. Yeah sure that's the case when you first start using it but it decreases with age. It's really dependant on the quality of the router.

Unless you have a laptop or something then you might want to get a small wireless router just for the laptop, even still if they hack into the communication between the laptop and the router they can get into the network if they can get all the passwords right. If you use a wired/wireless combo's and you set it up right there will be 2 passwords to hack to gain access to the entire network.

Simply - go wired

-HellFire

I love my wireless from the moment I set it up over a year ago (yeah, it took me that long to get in the flow ). I think it's safe enough for me to work in. Nothing is 100% safe. As long as you are transmitting data, it can be intervened and "stolen". Having some encryption will help a bit:

WEP is basically very weak and can be broken into without much work with the software we have out there these days. WPA is a bit more difficult to crack, but again, not 100% safe at all. I have WPA enabled on my router once I updated the firmware (supported WEP only before).

Like you said initially though, if there is a hacker that's determined to attack you, they will be able to do this...eventually.

These are the things that you might want to do:

- disable your SSID from being broadcasted
- change your SSID to something different than what it came with originally
- change the login password for your router
- enable WPA encryption (or at least WEP if you don't have WPA)
- enable MAC address filtering

Doing all these will stop a newbie "hacker". There are tools available that can get all these information from your router very easily.

i tihink that wireless is safe if you have got a safely password..

I still keep a wired network. However, I'm leeching off someone's open router right now. THe main reason why I have a wired network is I need the gigabyte speed for xgrid rendering.