5 Tips to Secure Your Wireless Network
May 16, 2010 at 02:05:46 PM, by Gilberto J. Perera
Are you taking advantage of all the security settings available in your network? Do you know what these settings are? If you’re clueless about what an SSID is or your 15 year old “computer whiz” nephew installed your wireless network, then you really need to take the time and review these tips.
Unlike wired networks that connect computers to a router and other computers using an Ethernet cable, wireless networks talk to devices using radio waves. These radio waves being open tend to be susceptible to a myriad of snooping attacks that if done correctly could provide sufficient information for a would-be hacker to access your network and all of your valuable information.
If you’re like most people you probably have multiple computers, home servers, Xbox, phones, and other devices all which contain valuable information like, family pictures, passwords, and other irreplaceable information. Imagine someone gaining access to your network and having the ability to destroy this information or worse steal it. Think of all the electronic bank statements, the information contained in your emails, your personal files. This is certainly a scenario no one wants to face.
Fortunately the toughest wireless encryption is pretty darn good and there are a number of preventive measures you can take to prevent others from gaining access to your home network. Follow the tips below to build your Fort Knox. If you have other tips you would like to share with others, please post them in the comments section below.
1. MAC Filters
Each network device has a unique hexadecimal value that identifies it. This unique identifier can be used to determine which device can access your network wirelessly and would in theory keep devices that are not on the MAC filter list from joining your network wirelessly. The problem with this filter is that if the intruder figures out which MAC addresses are allowed, he can get his device to pretend it’s using one of the allowed MAC addresses. This filter is great to keep out the least savvy intruders from accessing your network.
This is a standard feature in almost all wireless routers and can be found in the advanced configuration pages under MAC Address Filter, MAC Filtering, etc. The screenshot above is of a D-Link DIR 655 Wireless router.
2. Disable SSID Broadcasting
SSID or Service Set Identifier is the name assigned your wireless network. Think of all the times you start your wireless laptop and a slew of networks appear with the Linksys, 2WIRE1212, netlink, dlink, and all other names. These are all wireless networks that are broadcasting to the world, “I am here, connect to me!”
The screenshot above is of all the wireless networks in my condo that are broadcasting their signal right now. Without disabling the broadcasting of your SSID, which wireless networks do you think someone is going to try hack into, the one that is readily visible or the one which is not?
You can keep your router from telling the world it’s there by disabling the broadcasting of the SSID. These settings are normally found in the advanced wireless settings and are usually labeled Broadcast SSID or Visibility Status as in the case with the DIR-655.
Disabling the broadcasting of the SSID is not 100% secure, there are ways to locate networks even though they are not broadcasting information and a hacker can always guess what the SSID is, especially if you never changed the manufacturer’s name (Linksys, dlink, netgear, etc.). This tip is great if used in conjunction with the other tips on this page, so don’t rely on just this countermeasure to secure your network.
3. Use WPA2 Security
If you are going to use encryption don’t settle for anything less than WPA2. Other encryption methods have been hacked so that means that if you wireless network is still using WEP security please stop reading this article and go to your wireless router’s configuration page and change it. If you are not using any kind then you need to enable it otherwise people will use your internet connection and most likely access your personal files and information.
4. Use Complex Password
I don’t know how many times I have seen people who use passwords like abc123 or sparky to secure their wireless networks, online banking accounts, and other high risk items. Passwords like these can be cracked in seconds. When you create a wireless password make sure that you use a combination of numbers, letters (upper and lower case), and symbols.
You also need to make sure that password is long, the longer the password is, the more time required to crack it. How long do you think the password abc123 will take to crack in comparison to @35Fg-h34k!Lm4Rt6y? The more complex the password is, the more difficult it will be crack.
5. Use Guest Wireless Networks and Keep Friends Out of your Network
How many times has someone visiting your home asked you if they can have the password to access your network? Now imagine 2 scenarios, first you have to spell out the complex password that you have been using for your network, bank accounts, email, etc. Second that person misplaces the device. Now you have a device out there in the world with open access to your network…would you change your lock if you lost your house keys?
To prevent this situation you can use a common feature found in newer routers that allows you to create a Guest Network. A guest network is essentially a second network that the router creates which is completely isolated from the network your personal devices use.
Depending on the router settings can range from scheduling, intra zone routing, and its own security settings. The D-Link Router refers to this feature as the Guest Zone, but it may be labeled Guest Wireless or Guest Network by other manufacturers.
As you can see, there are several things that can be done to secure your wireless network so before you go on to another website, make sure you log in to your wireless router and verify the settings we went through to make sure you network is safe from intruders.
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