5 tips on securing your insecure wireless (wi-fi) network
| Posted in Security | Posted on 08-12-2009
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James Millway asked:
Wireless networks and routers are becoming more ubiquitious by the day. Many people are exchanging their traditional cabled networks with wireless as it provides many benefits. For example, users aren’t physically limited to one area as the radio waves of wireless networks can be broadcasted around the whole premises. However, there will always be problems which comes with benefits. One major problem is that many people don’t secure their wireless (wi-fi) networks. This allows people who are within the distances of the router broadcast limit to easily piggybank your connections. Why is this a problem? They’ll be stealing your internet bandwidth, making your internet connection slower. They may also take part in illegal activities such as downloading movies and musics from P2P networks and who gets the blame if the cops find out? You. Because its your network. So how do you secure your wireless (wi-fi) networks and routers? Here are some tips.
1. Secure your wireless administration interface
All wireless routers should come with a wireless administration interface. It allows you to many important jobs such as changing your wireless security router and modifying ports. How do you access the wireless administration interface? You have to first find out your Network Gateway number. Start run, and type in ‘cmd’. This should open the command inteface. Now, type in ‘ipconfig/all’ and a list of numbers should appear. Look for your default gateway number and note it down. Now open up an internet browser and type in http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx. The xs are your default gateway number. Enter your password and username, should be in your router manuals, and change your password to something secure.
2. Don’t broadcast your SSID
The SSID (Service Set Identifier) is a name used to specifically identy a wireless router. For example, your SSID Router would be ‘John’s router’ if you set it that way. If you want your wireless network to be private then don’t broadcast your SSID. Most wireless administration interface should give you the option to disable SSID broadcast.
3. Enable WEP encyrption protection
Include a WEP security protocol. This is basically a passwrod to unlock your network. Make it difficult to guess. Include upper case, lower case letters, numbers and symbols. Your WEP encryption password should be 13 letters long. Again, check the wireless router inteface to change your password (do you get how important it is now?).
4. Reduce your wireless transmiting power
Nowadays, you can get wireless standards 802.11g and 802.11n. These networks can brodcast radio waves as far as 25 metres or more. If all your computers are in one room then reduce yoru wireless transmitting power so that only computers in that specific room has access to the wirelesss network. Unfortunately, this feature isn’t available for all routing software programs. Search up your router model and see if it has it.
5. Use MAC filtering
Yoru MAC address (Media Access Control) address is a number which uniquely identifies a device in a network. So your laptop/computer will have a unique MAC address in a network. Turning on MAC filtering allows you to only enable certain devices to connect to your network. How do you filter? You’ll first need to identify the MAC addresses of all the devices which you want connected to the network then use the wireless router administration panel to exclude them from the filter.
Wireless networks and routers are becoming more ubiquitious by the day. Many people are exchanging their traditional cabled networks with wireless as it provides many benefits. For example, users aren’t physically limited to one area as the radio waves of wireless networks can be broadcasted around the whole premises. However, there will always be problems which comes with benefits. One major problem is that many people don’t secure their wireless (wi-fi) networks. This allows people who are within the distances of the router broadcast limit to easily piggybank your connections. Why is this a problem? They’ll be stealing your internet bandwidth, making your internet connection slower. They may also take part in illegal activities such as downloading movies and musics from P2P networks and who gets the blame if the cops find out? You. Because its your network. So how do you secure your wireless (wi-fi) networks and routers? Here are some tips.
1. Secure your wireless administration interface
All wireless routers should come with a wireless administration interface. It allows you to many important jobs such as changing your wireless security router and modifying ports. How do you access the wireless administration interface? You have to first find out your Network Gateway number. Start run, and type in ‘cmd’. This should open the command inteface. Now, type in ‘ipconfig/all’ and a list of numbers should appear. Look for your default gateway number and note it down. Now open up an internet browser and type in http://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx. The xs are your default gateway number. Enter your password and username, should be in your router manuals, and change your password to something secure.
2. Don’t broadcast your SSID
The SSID (Service Set Identifier) is a name used to specifically identy a wireless router. For example, your SSID Router would be ‘John’s router’ if you set it that way. If you want your wireless network to be private then don’t broadcast your SSID. Most wireless administration interface should give you the option to disable SSID broadcast.
3. Enable WEP encyrption protection
Include a WEP security protocol. This is basically a passwrod to unlock your network. Make it difficult to guess. Include upper case, lower case letters, numbers and symbols. Your WEP encryption password should be 13 letters long. Again, check the wireless router inteface to change your password (do you get how important it is now?).
4. Reduce your wireless transmiting power
Nowadays, you can get wireless standards 802.11g and 802.11n. These networks can brodcast radio waves as far as 25 metres or more. If all your computers are in one room then reduce yoru wireless transmitting power so that only computers in that specific room has access to the wirelesss network. Unfortunately, this feature isn’t available for all routing software programs. Search up your router model and see if it has it.
5. Use MAC filtering
Yoru MAC address (Media Access Control) address is a number which uniquely identifies a device in a network. So your laptop/computer will have a unique MAC address in a network. Turning on MAC filtering allows you to only enable certain devices to connect to your network. How do you filter? You’ll first need to identify the MAC addresses of all the devices which you want connected to the network then use the wireless router administration panel to exclude them from the filter.