Why do we need Wifi security

[Eviltechie]

So if somebody does bad things on the network, that is my fault? I think I'll go to starbucks and download some movies, then let starbucks get sued for copyright infringement, right?

[silentknight329]

So if somebody does bad things on the network, that is my fault?

if you have no proof you didnt.. i'd assume so

but remember... "to assume makes an ass out of you and me"

[H@L0_F00]

I've actually heard of people going to court over stuff like this (being sued by MPAA/DMCA) and getting away with it because they had an unencrypted router and the assholes (MPAA/DMCA) couldn't prove it was actually them.

I'm not sure how true this is though so don't blame me when you get sued ;)

You can also get away w/ ONLY downloading. NO uploading and you should be ok (99% of the time). And again, *cough* I do not promote the act of pirating ;)

[Joerg]

That was sarcasm, right :)

Right, although some clever marketing guys could eventually sell this as the "most secure encryption thing worldwide" :)

[pender]

There is some truth that WEP is enough to deter war drivers. THe main advantage of WPA/WPA2-PSK AES is that the bandwidth is not hampered by the encryption/decryption process as all devices that support WPA-PSK AES have dedicated encrypting/decrypting hardware.

WEP and WPA-PSK TKIP have actual real world bandwidth reduced TO a third of full potential. AES is roughly 95% the speed of an unencrypted network. WEP and TKIP are 25-35% of the full bandwidth. That alone is reason enough to switch.

There are articles on smallnetbuilder about this very issue.

[zemsten]

This is security also, but it's more backend and doesn't require passwords and such. If you want to have an unsecured network, MAC filtering is a good option. That way you allow only the computers you own to use the network. Although MACs can be spoofed, you can't find out what the allowed MACs are, so it'd be quite a long operation to spoof a correct MAC.

[Sparda]

This is security also, but it's more backend and doesn't require passwords and such. If you want to have an unsecured network, MAC filtering is a good option. That way you allow only the computers you own to use the network. Although MACs can be spoofed, you can't find out what the allowed MACs are, so it'd be quite a long operation to spoof a correct MAC.

You can see the mac address of any connected client, and which AP the client is associated to.

[ssmithisme]

Right, although some clever marketing guys could eventually sell this as the "most secure encryption thing worldwide" :)

The sad thing is thats true. The funny part is, people would sit there scratching their heads thinking its way harder than it is. :P

[zemsten]

You can see the mac address of any connected client, and which AP the client is associated to.

Shit, I'm retarded. I can't believe I overlooked that, I broke my neighbors WEP encryption a few months back and used Kismet and the aircrack-ng suite, so I even knew that. *Brain Fart*

Thanks for the correction though. :)

[joeypesci]

Watching "The man in the middle attack" HAK.5 did, should explain why you should protect your wifi. Also, I don't agree with the comment HAK.5 made when explaining how to protect against a man in the middle attack. Claiming no one would bother trying to get into a home network.

I disagree. I think they are the perfect target for some nasty people. We know some people possibly save their passwords to txt files etc. If you can get onto someone's unprotected wifi, it gives you all kinds of chances to get onto their PCs, silently, and harvest all kinds of personal info.

[vector]

i own a few of my neighbors internets. 6 to be exact. i dont ever have any malicious intent on the neighbors toobs though because i only want them for the bandwidth, i couldnt give a shit about their myspace logins or yahoo chats, although sometimes when im bored i'll sniff around and see what theyre doing. the idea is, if its your neighbors internet just keep a low profile on their networks so noone notices youre ever using them. but for the most part i would agree that even 40bit wep is enough to keep residential wlans secure. i do a lot of wardriving, and i wouldnt ever waste my time cracking any residential wlans when theres plenty of insecure businesses with much better data.

[Ingo]

Yeah, hitting the reset button will remove the password, and re assign the IP addresses in the house. That means the network printer and the tivo will likely stop working.

Quite possible, but finding network printer again takes like 5secs and atleast I don't know anyone who would have one.

not sure about TiVo, I have never had any experience with the system, but if it's designed anywhere near correctly then it shouldn't be much of a problem either.

[vector]

Quite possible, but finding network printer again takes like 5secs and atleast I don't know anyone who would have one.

not sure about TiVo, I have never had any experience with the system, but if it's designed anywhere near correctly then it shouldn't be much of a problem either.

depending on how they have addresses assigned. and with things like wireless print server adapters when you reset the router you have to reassociate the adapter on the router before your printer will work again.

[joeypesci]

On my setup I have WPA, MAC Filtering, use to have hidden SIDD but my phone didn't like that and no DHCP as all machines are set to static. Hardly anyone in my area that would bother trying to get on I don't think but still.

[dr0p]

I just use WPA2 and a 30+ char password. If anyone really wants in bad enough to bruteforce that, I'll let them stay on my network.

[MaxRabbit]

I'd like to address your first post, Eviltechie. As others have mentioned, it's quite possible a child pornographer would upload to your network. However, you will not get in trouble for this. They may threaten you, and take you to court, but without identifying it to your PC with something like a MAC address, you cannot get in trouble (in the US anyway).

And WEP encryption is useless. I can crack WEP on my 2 pound EEE PC 10 inch netbook in less than 1 minute. Fun stuff :)

You can also get away w/ ONLY downloading. NO uploading and you should be ok (99% of the time). And again, *cough* I do not promote the act of pirating ;)

Wrong. The RIAA has given up on cracking down on the average torrent user-and, if you are caught, will give you three warnings before you get in any trouble. Sources: here and here.

You can see the mac address of any connected client, and which AP the client is associated to.

On any network? Mind pointing me to a tutorial?

I disagree. I think they are the perfect target for some nasty people. We know some people possibly save their passwords to txt files etc. If you can get onto someone's unprotected wifi, it gives you all kinds of chances to get onto their PCs, silently, and harvest all kinds of personal info.

i own a few of my neighbors internets. 6 to be exact. i dont ever have any malicious intent on the neighbors toobs though because i only want them for the bandwidth, i couldnt give a shit about their myspace logins or yahoo chats, although sometimes when im bored i'll sniff around and see what theyre doing. the idea is, if its your neighbors internet just keep a low profile on their networks so noone notices youre ever using them. but for the most part i would agree that even 40bit wep is enough to keep residential wlans secure. i do a lot of wardriving, and i wouldnt ever waste my time cracking any residential wlans when theres plenty of insecure businesses with much better data.

How do you do this? I'd like to try it on my home network simply to see how it works. Can you show me how, or point me somewhere with this info?

[Sparda]

On any network? Mind pointing me to a tutorial?

Doesn't really need a tutorial, they are displayed when you run airodump.

[MaxRabbit]

Ah, I see.

[Dr. Ayton]

Just because some one has less security than you doesnt mean you cant become a target. if i was a malicious attacker, i would steal the identity from your neighbors network. then i would crack your wep key and steal your mac address.

[joeypesci]

At MaxRabbit. Off topic but I wonder where The Wall Street Journal got it's figures from. Back when Napster was being sued and they were claiming they were losing sales etc they actually failed to mentioned to the courts that, I believe it was 2004 or 2005, was the record year for album sales ever, so piracy wasn't actually having the negative effect they implied.

[MaxRabbit]

At MaxRabbit. Off topic but I wonder where The Wall Street Journal got it's figures from. Back when Napster was being sued and they were claiming they were losing sales etc they actually failed to mentioned to the courts that, I believe it was 2004 or 2005, was the record year for album sales ever, so piracy wasn't actually having the negative effect they implied.

Good question! That's why I love blogs more than major newspapers-they always have sources :)

[Deveant]

How come everybody is in a race to secure their networks? Is a simple 128-bit WEP enough to keep off your neighbors and the causal passerby? I could understand if someone was out to get you, but I doubt that most people are. I'm sure people could hack into my network, but why bother, my neighbor has an unencrypted network within range of my house. What is the big deal here?

Would you keep your keys in your car, and the doors unlocked on the nature strip?

[Eviltechie]

No, and I didn't here. I just locked the doors, but didn't bother with the alarm or deadbolt.