Wlan security
Wlan security
WLAN security has been a major issue since the early days of conception of the wireless networking standards. A lot has been done to bring everything into alignment and the industry standards prevailed as being IEEE 802.11b (or Wi-Fi). The idea was to enact some uniformity to express concerns over security. By meeting and being driven by industry standards, helped the end user be assured of quality. But as with anything in life, the more protected something is, the more of a challenge it becomes to some people to break through those levels of security, just because they can. People hack into other people’s systems either for the challenge or to enact some kind of malicious act. With WLAN security, it is seen as being a lot more vulnerable than the wired LAN ones. This is because to get access to LAN, there would need to be some degree of physical interaction. The only way to get access would be to enter into the building and physically access what is needed. With wireless however, the signals are being broadcast freely through the air. The main level of protection against this comes in the form of encryption that will be set by the WLAN router. The primary form of this level of security can in the form of WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy) but this fell short of its intended security protocols from the start. Of course the technology and protocols have been developed further, and it does offer levels of 64 and 128 Mbit encryption. Having a firewall in place will also add an extra level of protection to your WLAN security, which should detect any activity on the ports that should not be there. Also maintaining strong network passwords will help immensely. Because one of the main purposes of a network is to share files, it is important to keep files you want kept private, private! Your computer will be discoverable to some degree on a wireless network within an office environment, but at home, it will be up to you to decide how much of your files you want seen by others. Make sure that the airspace around is monitored well and constantly for rogue attacks. Improperly configured wireless local area networks will be prone to being vulnerable to outside attacks. Remember that the broadcast range of a network is likely to expand beyond the walls of the room. Rogue access points can gain access to a network, say for example sat in a car in the parking lot. Find the routers to use that offer multiple layers of encryption and do not just rely on one method. The more you can do to enforce WLAN security will pay dividends in the long run. If nothing happens then you know that you did a good job in keeping your network protected.